LIBRARY 

OF  THE 

University  of  California. 


Gl  FT    OF 


Class 


f-^-i:'^ 


M 


>.  .^^-  / 


To  the  Congress  of  the  United  States. 


H  flDemonal 

IN  BEHALF  OF  THE  ARCHITECT  OF  OUR 
FEDERAL  CONSTITUTION, 

Pelatiah  Webster 

of  Philadelphia,  Penn. 


HEREIN  IS  REPRINTED,  EOR  THE  FIRST  TIME  IN  II 6  YEARS,  THE 
EPOCH-MAKING  PAPER  PUBUSHED  BY  PELATIAH  WEBSTER  AT 
PHILADELPHIA,  FEBRUARY  i6TH,  1 783,  AND  THERE  REPUBLISHED 
WITH  NOTES  IN  1 791,  IN  WHICH  HE  ANNOUNCED  TO  THE  WORLD, 
as  his  invention,  THE  ENTIRE  plan  OF  THE  existing  CONSTITUTION 
OF  THE  UNITED  STATES,  WORKED  OUT  IN  DETAIL  MORE  THAN  FOUR 
YEARS  BEFORE  THE  FEDERi\L  CONVENTION  OF  1 787  MET. 

Humbly  presented  by 

H.\NNIS  TAYLOR. 


hf 


Of  / 

To  the  Congress  of  the  United  States: 

The  purpose  of  this  memorial  is  twofold:  first,  to  place 
in  the  hands  of  Congress  the  data  for  a  new  and  pivotal 
chapter  in  the  history  of  the  Constitution  that  will  impress 
upon  succeeding  generations  the  all-important  fact  that 
every  basic  principle  which  differentiates  our  existing 
federal  S3^stem  from  all  that  have  preceded  it  was  a  part 
of  a  single  invention  struck  off  at  a  given  time  by  the  brain 
and  purpose  of  one  man;  second,  to  press  upon  Congress 
the  long  neglected  duty  of  honoring,  by  an  appropriate 
monument,  the  memory  of  an  American  statesman  and 
patriot  who  has  made  a  larger  personal  contribution  to  the 
science  of  government  than  any  other  one  individual  in  the 
histor}^  of  mankind.  From  the  data  thus  presented  it 
clearly  appears  that  among  our  nation-builders  Pelatiah 
Webster  stands  second  to  Washington  alone.  All  the 
world  understands  in  a  vague  and  general  way  that  certain 
path-breaking  principles  entered  into  the  structure  of  our 
second  federal  constitution  of  1789  which  differentiate  it 
from  all  other  systems  of  federal  government  that  have 
preceded  it.  M.  de  Tocqueville  gave  formal  expression 
to  that  understanding  when  he  said:  "This  Constitution, 
which  may  at  first  be  confounded  with  federal  constitutions 
that  have  preceded  it,  rests  in  truth  upon  a  wholly  novel 
theory  which  may  he  considered  a  great  discovery  in  modern 
political  science.  In  the  confederations  that  preceded  the 
American  Constitution  of  1789,  the  allied  states,  for  a 
common  object,  agreed  to  obey  the  injunctions  of  a  federal 
government;  but  they  reserved  to  themselves  the  right  of 
ordaining  and  enforcing  the  execution  of  the  laws  of  the 
Union.     The   American   States,  which  combined   in    1789, 


Madison,  nor  Charles  Pinckney,  nor  Sherman,  nor  Ellsworth, 
nor  Hamilton,  nor  any  of  their  biographers,  so  far  as  the 
writer  is  informed,  ever  set  up  such  a  claim  in  behalf  of  any 
one  of  them.  The  answer  to  "the  simple  and  inevitable 
question"  just  propounded  is  this:  jThe  common  source 
from  which  the  draftsmen  of  the  four  plans  drew  the  path- 
breaking  invention  underlying  them  all  was  "A  Dissertation 
on  the  Political  Union  and  Constitution  of  the  thirteen 
United  States  of  North  America,"  published  at  Philadelphia 
by  Pelatiah  Webster,  February  i6,  1783,  and  there  repub- 
lished by  him  with  copious  notes  in  1791,  and  herein  repro- 
duced for  the  first  time  after  the  lapse  of  116  years.  In 
that  immortal  paper,  whose  lightest  words  are  weighty, 
he  gave  to  the  world,  as  his  personal  contribution  to  the 
science  of  government,  and  as  an  entirety  worked  out  in  great 
detail  the  "wholly  novel  theory"  of  federal  government 
upon  which  reposes  the  existing  Constitution  of  the  United 
States. 

Prior  to  the  date  in  question  no  single  element  of  that 
theory  had  ever  been  propounded  by  anyone.  In  a  note 
appended  to  the  republication  of  1791  the  great  inventor 
gives  the  following  account  of  the  circumstances  under 
which  the  invention  was  made:  "At  the  time  when  this 
Dissertation  was  written  (February  16,  1783)  the  defects 
and  insufficiency  of  the  Old  Federal  Constitution  were 
universally  felt  and  acknowledged;  it  was  manifest,  not 
only  that  the  internal  police,  justice,  security,  and  peace 
of  the  States  could  never  be  preserved  under  it,  but  the 
finances  and  public  credit  would  necessarily  become  so 
embarrassed,  precarious,  and  void  of  support,  that  no  public 
movement,  which  depended  on  the  revenue,  could  be 
managed  with  any  effectual  certainty:  but  tho'  the  public 
mind  was  under  full  conviction  of  all  these  mischiefs,  and 


was  contemplating  a  remedy,  yet  the  pubuc  ideas  WERE 

NOT  AT  ALL  CONCENTRATED,  MUCH  LESS  ARRANGED  INTO 
ANY  NEW  SYSTEM   OR   FORM   OF  GOVERNMENT,   which   WOUld 

obviate  these  evils.  Under  these  circumstances,  I  offered 
this  Dissertation  to  the  public:  how  far  the  principles  of 
it  were  adopted  or  rejected  in  the  New  Constitution,  which 
was  four  years  afterwards  (Sep.  17,  1787)  formed  by  the 
General  Convention,  and  since  ratified  by  all  the  States,  is 
obvious  to  every  one." 

At  the  same  time  he  added:  "I  was  fully  of  opinion 
(tho'  the  sentiment  at  that  time  would  not  very  well  bear) 
that  it  would  be  ten  times  easier  to  form  a  new  Constitution 
than  to  mend  the  old  one.  I  therefore  sat  myself  down  to 
sketch  out  the  leading  principles  of  that  political  Co7istitu- 
tion,  which  I  thought  necessary  to  the  preservation  and 
happiness  of  the  United  States  of  America,  which  are  com- 
prised in  this  Dissertation.  I  hope  the  reader  will  please 
to  consider,  that  these  are  the  original  thoughts  of  a  private 
individual,  dictated  by  the  nature  of  the  subject  only,  long 
before  the  important  theme  became  the  great  object  of 
discussion,  in  the  most  dignified  and  important  assembly 
which  ever  sat  or  decided  in  America."  The  great  inventor 
perfectly  understood  the  merits  of  his  own  case  which  he 
thus  stated  with  the  lucidity  of  a  Greek  and  the  terseness 
of  a  Roman.  As  early  as  1781  Pelatiah  Webster  was  the 
first  to  propose  to  the  people  of  the  United  States,  in  one 
of  his  financial  essays  published  at  Philadelphia  in  May  of 
that  year,  the  calling  of  "  a  Continental  Convention  "  for  the 
making  of  a  new  Constitution.*  In  bearing  testimony  to 
that  fact  Madison  said  that  Pelatiah  Webster,  "after  dis- 

*The  fact  that "  Alexander  Hamilton  made  the  same  suggestion  in  a  private 
letter  to  James  Duane,  September  3,  1780,"  is  of  no  importance.  It~was  not 
a  public  act, not  even  a  public  declaration.  See  Gaillard  Hunt's  "Life  of 
James  Madison,"  p.  108. 


cussing  the  fiscal  system  of  the  United  States,  and  suggesting, 
among  other  remedial  provisions,  one  including  a  national 
bank,  remarks,  that  'the  authority  of  Congress  is  very 
inadequate  to  the  performance  of  their  duties;  and  this 
indicates  the  necessity  of  their  calling  a  Continental  Conven- 
tion for  the  express  purpose  of  ascertaining,  defining,  enlarg- 
ing and  limiting,  the  duties  and  powers  of  their  Constitu- 
tion.'"* Two  years  after  he  had  thus  sounded  the  tocsin 
for  the  States  to  assemble,  he  made  the  invention  and  pub- 
lished to  the  world,  in  detail,  the  plan  upon  which  the  Con- 
stitution was  to  be  formed.  While  the  historian  Bancroft t 
failed  to  appreciate  the  stupendous  importance  of  his  work, 
he  frankly  admits  that  he  actually  performed  it  when  he  says : 
"The  public  mind  was  ripening  for  a  transition  from  a 
confederation  to  a  real  government.  Just  at  this  time 
Pelatiah  Webster,  a  graduate  of  Yale  College,  in  a  disser- 
tation published  at  Philadelphia,  proposed  for  the  legis- 
lature of  the  United  States  a  congress  of  two  houses  which 
should  have  ample  authority  for  making  laws  'of  general 
necessity  and  utility,'  and  enforcing  them  as  well  on  indi- 
viduals as  on  States.  He  further  suggested  not  only  heads 
of  executive  departments,  but  judges  of  law  and  chancery. 
The  tract  awakened  so  much  attention  that  it  was  reprinted 
in  Hartford,  and  called  forth  a  reply. "$  In  both  of  the 
scanty  and  stingy  biographical  notices  of  him  in  the  leading 
American  Encyclopaedias,  the  statement  is  made  that 
his  plan  "is  mentioned  by  James  Madison  as  having  an 
influence  in  directing  the  public  mind  to  the  necessity  of  a 
better  form  of  government."  Pelatiah  Webster  needs  the 
admissions  neither  of  Madison  nor  Bancroft  to  establish 

♦The  Madison  Papers  (1841),  vol.  ii,  pp.  706-7. 

t  History  of  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States,  vol.  i,  p.  86. 

X  It  was  replied  to  anonymously  by  Roger  Sherman. 


his  title  to  the  authorship  of  the  "wholly  novel  theory" 
now  embodied  in  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States, 
because  that  title  rests  upon  contemporary  documentary 
evidence  as  clear  and  convincing  as  that  upon  which  rests 
Jefferson's  title  to  the  authorship  of  the  Declaration  of 
Independence.  If  that  be  true,  then  he  has  made  a  larger 
personal  contribution  to  the  science  of  government  than 
any  other  one  individual  in  the  history  of  mankind.  Among 
our  nation-builders  he  stands  second  to  Washington  alone. 
And  yet  among  them  all  he  only  has  been  neglected  and 
forgotten  by  his  countrymen,  not  through  any  conscious 
omission,  but  because  of  a  careless  historical  scholarship 
which  has  failed  to  present  his  great  achievement  in  its 
true  light.  That  conviction  has  impelled  the  undersigned — 
who  has  devoted  more  than  thirty  years  to  the  special 
study  of  the  origin  and  growth  of  our  constitutional  systems, 
state  and  federal — to  present  to  the  Congress  herein,  very 
briefly,  the  historical  data  upon  which  Pelatiah  Webster's 
right  to  immortality  depends.  He  it  was  who  first  suggested 
the  separate  existence  of  the  two  houses  of  Congress,  when, 
in  1783,  he  said  "That  the  Congress  shall  consist  of  two 
chambers,  an  upper  and  lower  house,  or  senate  and  commons, 
with  the  concurrence  of  both  necessary  to  every  act;  and  that 
every  State  send  one  or  more  delegates  to  each  house: 
this  will  subject  every  act  to  two  discussions  before  two 
distinct  chambers  of  men  equally  qualified  for  the  debate, 
equally  masters  of  the  subject,  and  of  equal  authority  in  the 
decision."*  Prior  to  that  utterance  no  federal  assembly, 
ancient  or  modern,  had  ever  consisted  of  two  chambers; 
no  one  had  ever  suggested  such  an  idea.  If  after  a  careful 
examination  of  all  the  facts  the  Congress  shall  deem  the 
architect  of  our  federal  constitution  unworthy  of  a  monu- 

*The  italics  in  all  the  quotations  from  Pelatiah  Webster's  paper  are  his  own. 


8 

ment,  the  undersigned  prays  in  his  behalf  that  this  humble 
memorial  may  be  embodied  in  its  records  so  that  succeeding 
generations  may  determine  for  themselves  whether  or  no 
his  work  has  been  justly  judged. 

I. 

FEDERAL  GOVERNMENTS  PRIOR  TO  AND  INCLUDING  THAT 

OF  1776. 

From  the  days  of  the  Greek  Leagues  doMTi  to  the  making 
of  the  second  constitution  of  the  United  States,  all  federal 
governments  had  been  constructed  on  a  single  plan  at  once 
clumsy  and  inefficient.  The  most  perfect  of  the  Greek 
Leagues  was  the  Achaian,  of  which  the  framers  really  knew 
nothing,  as  we  learn  from  Madison  who  tells  us  in  the  Feder- 
alists (xviii)  that  "could  the  interior  structure  and  regular 
operation  of  the  Achaian  League  be  ascertained,  it  is 
probable  that  more  light  might  be  thrown  by  it  on  the 
science  of  federal  government  than  by  any  like  experiments 
with  which  we  are  acquainted."  The  coveted  knowledge 
was  not  accessible  because  the  historical  scholars  who  have 
since  passed  beyond  the  Greece  of  Thucydides  into  the 
Greece  of  Polybios,  who  have  passed  beyond  the  period  in 
which  the  independent  city-commonwealth  was  the  domi- 
nant political  idea  into  the  later  and  less  brilliant  period 
of  Hellenic  freedom  occupied  by  the  history  of  Greek  feder- 
alism, had  not  then  completed  their  investigations,  only 
fully  worked  out  in  very  recent  years.*  Such  scanty 
knowledge  as  the  framers  did  possess  of  Greek  federalism 
seems  to  have  been  chiefly  drawn  from  the  little  work  of  the 
Abb^  Mably,  ObserTjations  sur  VHistoire  de  Grece  (Federalist, 

*The  first  volume  (History  of  Greek  Federations)  of  Edward  A.  Freeman's 
great  History  of  Federal  Government  was  not  published  until  1863. 


xviii).  The  only  federal  governments  with  whose  internal 
organizations  the  builders  of  our  federal  republic  were  really 
familiar,  and  whose  histories  had  any  practical  effect  upon 
their  work,  were  those  that  had  grown  up  between  the 
Low-Dutch  communities  at  the  mouth  of  the  Rhine,  and 
between  the  High- Dutch  communities  in  the  mountains 
of  Switzerland,  and  upon  the  plains  of  Germany  (Federalist, 
xix,  xx).  Down  to  the  making  of  the  second  constitution 
of  the  United  States,  the  Confederation  of  Swiss  Cantons, 
the  United  Provinces  of  the  Netherlands,  and  the  German 
Confederation  really  represented  the  total  advance  made 
by  the  modern  world  in  the  structure  of  federal  governments. 
Such  advance  was  embodied  in  the  idea  of  a  federal  system 
made  up  of  a  union  of  states,  cities  or  districts,  representa- 
tives from  which  composed  a  single  federal  assembly  whose 
limited  powers  could  be  brought  to  bear,  not  upon  individual 
citizens,  but  only  upon  cities  or  states  as  such.  The  funda- 
mental principle  upon  which  all  such  fabrics  rested  was  the 
requisition  system,  under  which  the  federal  assembly  was 
only  endowed  with  the  power  to  make  requisitions  for  men 
and  money  upon  the  states  or  cities  composing  the  league 
for  federal  purposes,  while  the  states,  alone,  in  their  corporate 
capacity  possessed  the  power  to  execute  them.  The  initial 
effort  of  the  English  colonies  in  America  along  the  path 
of  federal  union  ended  with  the  making  of  the  first  consti- 
tution of  the  United  States  embodied  in  the  Articles  of 
Confederation.  Up  to  that  point  nothing  new  had  been 
achieved ;  the  fruit  of  the  first  effort  was  simply  a  confedera- 
tion, constructed  upon  a  plan  over  two  thousand  years  old, 
which  could  only  deal  through  the  requisition  system  with 
states  as  states.  That  confederation  possessed  no  power 
(i)  to  operate  directly  upon  the  individual  citizen;  (2)  it 
had   no   independent   power   of   taxation;  (3)    the   federal 


lO 

head  was  not  divided  into  three  departments,  executive, 
legislative  and  judicial;  (4)  the  federal  assembly  consisted 
of  one  chamber  instead  of  two.*  The  lack  of  power  to  levy 
and  collect  for  itself  federal  or  national  taxes  rendered  our 
first  federal  government  preeminently  a  failure  as  a  finan- 
cial system,  dependent  as  it  was  upon  the  will  of  thirteen 
independent  legislatures. 

II. 

PELATIAH  WEBSTER'S  INVENTION  AND  THE  SECOND 
FEDERAL  CONSTITUTION  OF  1787. 

The  most  scientific  writer  upon  finance  during  the  Revo- 
lutionary War  was  Pelatiah  Webster,  whose  essays  on  that 
subject  fill  a  volume. t  He  was  born  at  Lebanon,  Connecticut, 
in  1725,  and  graduated  at  Yale  College  in  1746.  In  1755 
he  removed  to  Philadelphia,  where  he  became  a  prosperous 
merchant,  and  in  due  time  an  ardent  supporter  of  the 
patriot  cause  in  the  War  of  the  Revolution,  aiding  with 
pen  and  purse.  He  was  captured  by  the  British,  and,  on 
account  of  his  ardor  was  imprisoned  for  four  months.  As 
early  as  October,  1776,  he  began  to  write  on  the  currency 
and  in  1779  he  commenced  the  publication  at  Philadelphia 
of  a  series  of  "  Essays  on  Free  Trade  and  Finance."  He  was 
sufficiently  important  as  a  political  economist  to  be  con- 
sulted by  the  Continental  Congress  as  to  the  resources  of 
the  country.  His  financial  studies  soon  convinced  him  that 
no  stable  fiscal  system  could  be  established  until  the  then 
existing  federal  government  was  wiped  out  and  superseded 
by  one  endowed  with  independent  taxing  power.     There- 

*See  Pelatiah  Webster's  masterful  analysis  of  the  first  Constitution  con- 
tained in  his  Notes  published  in  1791,  infra,  p.  48. 

fThe  second  edition  of  1791  was  "Printed  and  sold  by  Joseph  Crukshank, 
No.  91,  High  Street,"  Philadelphia. 


II 

fore,  as  early  as  1781,  in  one  of  his  financial  essays,  he  made 
the  first  public  call  for  the  "Continental  Convention," 
referred  to  by  Madison,  to  be  armed  with  power  to  devise 
an  adequate  system  of  federal  government.  Having  thus 
taken  the  first  step,  he  set  himself  to  work  to  formulate  in 
advance  such  an  adequate  system  as  the  Convention  should 
adopt,  whenever  it  might  meet.  In  the  great  tract  pub- 
lished at  Philadelphia,  February  16,  1783,  we  have  photo- 
graphed for  us  the  workings  of  his  mind  as  he  moved  along 
paths  never  trod  before.  He  sounded  the  ke3^-note  when 
he  declared:  "They  (the  supreme  power)  must  therefore 
of  necessity  be  vested  with  a  power  of  taxation.  I  know  this 
is  a  most  important  and  weighty  truth,  a  dreadful  engine 
of  oppression,  tyranny,  and  injury,  when  ill  used;  yet,  from 
the  necessity  of  the  case,  it  must  be  admitted. 

For  to  give  a  supreme  authority  a  power  of  making 
contracts,  without  any  power  of  payment — of  appointing 
officers,  civil  and  military  without  money  to  pay  them; 
power  to  build  ships,  without  any  money  to  do  it  with; 
a  power  of  emitting  money,  without  any  power  to  redeem 
it;  or  of  borrowing  money  without  any  power  to  make 
payment  etc. — such  solecisms  in  government  are  so  nuga- 
tory and  absurd,  that  I  really  think  to  offer  further  argument 
on  the  subject  would  be  to  insult  the  understanding  of  my 
readers.  To  make  all  these  payments  dependent  on  the 
votes  of  thirteen  popular  assemblies,  who  will  undertake  to 
judge  of  the  propriety  of  every  contract  and  every  occasion 
of  money,  and  grant  or  withhold  supplies  according  to  their 
opinion,  whilst  at  the  same  time  the  operations  of  the  whole 
may  be  stopped  by  the  vote  of  a  single  one  of  them,  is 
absurd."  Thus  Pelatiah  Webster  proposed  the  existing 
system  of  federal  taxation,  then  entirely  new,  to  the  world; 
thus  he  proposed  that  the  ancient  system  of  requisitions, 


12 

resting  on  the  taxing  power  of  the  states,  should  be  super- 
seded by  a  system  of  federal  or  national  taxation  extending 
to  everv^  citizen,  directly  or  indirectly.  Instead  of  the 
lifeless  system  of  absurdity  embodied  in  the  Articles  of 
Confederation,  he  proposed  to  substitute  a  self -executing 
and  self-sustaining  national  system,  based  on  the  following 
propositions,  stated  in  his  o\vn  language:  ''The  supreme 
authority  of  any  State  must  have  power  enough  to  affect  the 
ends  of  its  appointment,  otherwise  these  ends  cannot  be 
answered  and  effectually  secured  ...  I  begin  with  my  first 
and  great  principle,  viz..  That  the  Constitution  must  vest 
powers  in  every  department  sufficient  to  secure  and  make 
effectual  the  ends  of  it.  The  supreme  authority  must  have 
the  power  of  making  war  and  peace — of  appointing  armies 
and  navies — of  appointing  officers  both  civil  and  military — 
of  making  contracts — of  emitting,  coining,  and  borrowing 
money — of  regulating  trade — of  making  treaties  with  foreign 
powers — of  establishing  post-offices — and,  in  short,  of  doing 
everything  which  the  well-being  of  the  Commonwealth  may 
require,  and  which  is  not  compatible  to  any  particular  State, 
all  of  which  require  money,  and  cannot  possibly  be  made 
effectual  without  it  .  .  .  This  tax  can  be  laid  by  the 
supreme  authority  much  more  conveniently  than  by  the 
particular  Assemblies,  and  would  in  no  case  be  subject  to 
their  repeals  or  modifications;  and  of  course  the  public 
credit  would  never  be  dependent  on,  or  liable  to  bankruptcy 
by  the  humors  of  any  particular  assembly  .  .  .  The  dele- 
gates which  are  to  form  that  august  body,  which  are  to 
hold  and  exercise  the  supreme  authority,  ought  to  be 
appointed  by  the  States  in  any  manner  they  please."  In  for- 
mulating his  conclusions  as  to  the  supremacy  of  federal 
law  acting  directly  on  all  citizens,  he  said:  "(i)  No  laws  of 
any  State  whatever,  which  do  not  carry  in  them  a  force  which 


13 

extends  to  their  effectual  and  final  execution,  can  afford  a 
certain  or  sufficient  security  to  the  subject — this  is  too  plain 
to  need  proof ;  (2)  Laws  or  ordinances  of  any  kind  (especially 
of  august  bodies  of  high  dignity  and  consequence) ,  which  fail 
of  execution,  are  much  worse  than  none;  they  weaken  the  gov- 
ernment; expose  it  to  contempt  ...  A  government  which 
is  but  half  executed,  or  whose  operations  may  all  be  stopped 
by  a  single  vote,  is  the  most  dangerous  of  all  institutions  .  .  . 
Further  I  propose  that  if  the  execution  of  any  act  or  order 
of  the  supreme  authority  shall  be  opposed  by  force  in  any  of 
the  States  (which  God  forbid !)  it  shall  be  lawful  for  Congress 
to  send  into  such  State  a  sufficient  force  to  suppress  it. 
On  the  whole,  I  take  it  that  the  very  existence  and  use  of 
our  union  effectually  depends  on  the  full  energy  and  final 
effect  of  the  laws  made  to  support  it;  and  therefore  I  sacri- 
fice all  other  considerations  to  this  energy  and  effect,  and  if  our 
Union  is  not  worth  this  purchase  we  must  give  it  up — the 
nature  of  the  thing  does  not  admit  any  other  alternative." 
In  these  ringing  terms  was  announced  the  path-breaking 
invention  of  a  supreme  and  self -executing  federal  govern- 
ment operating  directly  upon  the  citizen ;  an  invention  for 
which  the  world  had  been  waiting  for  two  thousand  years; 
an  invention  of  which  no  trace  or  hint  is  to  be  found  in  the 
Constitutions  of  any  of  the  Teutonic  Leagues,  in  the  Articles 
of  Confederation,  or  in  the  prior  utterance  of  any  other  man. 

Having  thus  defined  his  fundamental  concept  of  a  federal 
government  operating  directly  on  the  citizen,  the  great  one 
boldly  accepted  the  inevitable  corollary'  that  such  a  govern- 
ment must  be  strictly  organized  and  equipped  with  machin- 
ery adequate  to  its  ends — with  the  usual  branches,  executive, 
legislative,  and  judicial;  with  its  army,  its  navy,  its  civil 
service,  and  all  the  usual  apparatus  of  a  government,  all 
bearing  directly  upon  every  citizen  of  the  Union  without 


14 

any  reference  to  the  government  of  the  several  States. 
No  such  federal  government,  ancient  or  modem,  had  ever 
existed.  As  Montesquieu  was  the  first  to  point  out,  the 
division  of  state  powers  into  executive,  legislative  and 
judicial,  originated  in  that  single  State  in  Britain  we  call 
England.*  From  that  single  State  the  principle  passed 
into  the  single  States  of  the  American  Union. f  Pelatiah 
Webster  was  the  first  to  conceive  of  the  application  of  the 
principle  of  the  division  of  powers  to  a  federal  state ;  he  was 
the  first  to  propose  that  the  federal  head  should  be  divided 
and  then  organized  as  the  particular  ones  are  into  legis- 
lative, executive,  and  judicial.  More  than  three  years  later 
Jefferson  endorsed  that  idea  by  commending  it  to  Madison.  { 
Having  thus  made  his  second  great  invention,  Webster 
proceeded  to  explain  how  the  three  departments,  executive, 
legislative,  and  judicial,  should  be  organized.  His  idea  was 
that  the  executive  power  should  be  vested  in  a  council  of 
ministers  to  be  grouped  around  a  President  elected  by 
Congress.  On  that  subject  he  said:  "These  ministers  will 
of  course  have  the  best  information,  and  most  perfect 
knowledge,  of  the  state  of  the  Nation,  as  far  as  it  relates  to 
their  several  departments,  and  will  of  course  be  able  to  give 
the  best  information  to  Congress,  in  what  manner  any  bill 
proposed  will  affect  the  public  interest  in  their  several 
departments,  which  will  nearly  comprehend  the  whole. 
The  Financier  manages  the  whole  subject  of  the  revenues 
and  expenditures;  the  Secretary  of  State  takes  knowledge 
of  the  general  policy  and  internal  government ;  the  Minister 
of  War  presides  in  the  whole  business  of  war  and  defence; 
and  the  Minister  of  Foreign  Affairs  regards  the  whole  state 

*  Spirit  of  Laws,  bk.  xi,  ch.  6. 

•[Federalist,  xlvi. 

Jin  the  letter  written  from  Paris,  December  i6,  1786,  heretofore  cited. 


15 

of  the  nation,  as  it  stands  related  to,  or  connected  with, 
all  foreign  powers  ...  I  would  further  propose,  that  the 
aforesaid  great  ministers  of  state  shall  compose  a  Council  of 
State,  to  whose  number  Congress  may  add  three  others,  viz., 
one  from  New  England,  one  from  the  Middle  States  and  one 
from  the  Southern  States,  one  of  which  to  be  appointed 
President  by  Congress."  To  the  organization  of  the  legis- 
lative department  Webster  gave  elaborate  consideration. 
Just  as  no  prior  federal  government  had  ever  been  divided 
into  three  departments,  so  no  prior  federal  legislature 
had  ever  been  divided  into  two  houses.  The  one-chamber 
body  represented  by  the  Continental  Congress  was  the  type 
of  every  other  federal  assembly  that  had  ever  preceded  it. 
As  stated  heretofore  the  path-breaker,  looking  to  the  English 
bicameral  system  as  it  had  appeared  in  the  several  States, 
proposed  "  That  the  Congress  shall  consist  of  two  chambers, 
an  upper  and  lower  house,  or  senate  and  commons,  with  the 
concurrence  of  both  necessary  to  every  act;  and  that  every 
State  send  one  or  more  delegates  to  each  house:  this  will 
subject  every  act  to  two  discussions  before  two  distinct 
chambers  of  m.en  equally  qualified  for  the  debate,  equally 
masters  of  the  subject, and  of  equal  authority \n  the  decision." 
Citizens  of  the  United  States,  to  whom  such  a  division  now 
seems  a  matter  of  course,  should  remember  that  when 
Webster  proposed  it,  it  was  an  unprecedented  novelty  in  the 
history  of  the  world,  so  far  as  federal  legislatures  are  con- 
cerned. After  an  elaborate  discussion  of  the  qualifications 
of  members  of  Congress,  in  which  he  sharply  assailed  the 
then  existing  rule  forbidding  their  reelection,  he  proceeded 
to  define  a  part  of  the  original  jurisdiction  of  the  Supreme 
Court  of  the  United  States  by  saying  "that  the  supreme 
authority  should  be  vested  with  powers  to  terminate  and 
finally  decide  controversies  arising  between  different  States." 


i6 

He  also  said  "To  these  I  would  add  Judges  of  law  and 
chancery.'"  Thus  the  entire  federal  judicial  system  was 
distinctly  outlined.  Above  all  he  was  careful  to  define  the 
reserved  powers  of  the  States.  On  that  subject  he  said: 
"I  propose  further,  that  the  powers  of  Congress,  and  all 
the  other  departments  acting  under  them,  shall  all  be 
restricted  to  such  matters  only  of  general  necessity  and  utility 
to  all  the  States,  as  cannot  come  within  the  jurisdiction 
of  any  particular  State,  or  to  which  the  authority  of  any 
particular  State  is  not  competent:  so  that  each  particular 
State  shall  enjoy  all  sovereignty  and  supreme  authority 
to  all  intents  and  purposes,  excepting  only  those  high 
authorities  and  powers  by  them  delegated  to  Congress, 
for  the  purposes  of  the  general  union."  In  that  passage 
we  have  the  first  draft,  and  a  very  complete  one,  of  the 
Tenth  Amendment.*  So  it  is  a  matter  of  documentary 
evidence  that  every  element  that  entered  into  the  "wholly 
novel  theory,  which  may  be  considered  a  great  discovery 
in  modem  political  science,"  and  which  differentiates  our 
second  federal  constitution  of  1789  from  every  other  that 
preceded  it,  was  the  deliberate  invention  of  Pelatiah  Webster, 
who  announced  to  the  world  that  theory,  as  an  entirety, 
in  his  epoch-making  paper  of  February  16,  1783.  Prior 
to  that  date  no  federal  government  had  ever  existed  (i)  that 
operated  directly  on  the  individual  citizen;  (2)  no  federal 
government  had  ever  been  divided  into  three  departments, 
executive,  legislative  and  judicial;  (3)  no  federal  legislature 
had  ever  been  divided  into  an  upper  and  lower  house. 
There  is  no  record,  there  is  not  even  a  claim  that,  prior 
to  that  date,  any  human  being  had  ever  propounded  anyone 

♦It  provides  that  "  The  powers  not  delegated  to  the  United  States  by  the 
Constitution,  nor  prohibited  by  it  to  the  States,  are  reserved  to  the  States 
respectively  or  to  the  people." 


of  those  principles  in  connection  with  a  federal  government. 
The  great  inventor  was  so  conscious  at  the  time  of  the 
magnitude  of  his  undertaking  that  he  exclaimed  as  he  wrote  : 
"May  Almighty  wisdom  direct  my  pen  in  this  arduous  discus- 
sion." In  conclusion  he  said  "This  vast  subject  lies  with 
mighty  weight  on  my  mind,  and  I  have  bestowed  on  it  my 
utmost  attention,  and  here  offer  the  public  the  best  thoughts 
and  sentiments  I  am  master  of  .  .  .  I  have  not  the  vanity 
to  imagine  that  my  sentiments  may  be  adopted ;  I  shall  have 
all  the  reward  I  wish  or  expect,  if  my  Dissertation  shall  throw 
any  light  on  the  great  subject,  shall  excite  an  emulation 
of  inquiry,  and  animate  some  abler  genius  to  form  a  plan  of 
greater  perfection,  less  objectionable,  and  more  useful." 
In  his  republication  of  1791  he  described  perfectly  the 
circumstances  under  which  the  great  invention  of  February 
16,  1783,  was  made,  when  he  said  that,  "the  public  ideas 
were  not  at  all  concentrated,  much  less  arranged  into  any 
new  system  or  form  of  government,  which  would  obviate 
these  evils.  Under  these  circumstances  I  offered  this  Dis- 
sertation to  the  public."  In  that  Dissertation,  Pelatiah 
Webster  presented,  as  a  free  gift  to  the  great  country  that 
has  neglected  and  forgotten  him,  the  "new  system  or  form 
of  government"  which  passed,  through  the  four  "plans"* 
offered  in  the  Federal  Convention  of  1787,  into  the  existing 
Constitution  of  the  United  States.  Certainly  no  more 
"wonderful  work  was  ever  struck  off  at  a  given  time  by  the 

*At  a  later  time  a  grave  controversy  arose  as  to  "the  singularly  minute 
coincidences  between  the  draft  of  a  Federal  government  communicated  by 
Mr.  Charles  Pinckney  of  South  Carolina,  to  Mr.  Adams,  Secretary  of  State," 
the  Virginia  plan,  and  the  Constitution  as  finally  adopted.  Every  explana- 
tion was  given  of  "the  singularly  minute  coincides,"  except  the  plain  and 
obvious  one — the  four  plans  out  of  which  the  Constitution  arose  were  taken  from 
a  common  source.  For  a  statement  of  the  controversy  in  question  see  Rives' 
Life  and  Times  of  Madison,  vol.  ii,  pp.  353-357. 


i.\  A  l^ 


brain  and  purpose  of  man."  The  outcome  of  that  work 
was  a  novel  and  unique  creation  operating  directly  on  the 
people,  and  not  upon  the  States  as  corporations.  The 
State  governments  are  not  subject  to  the  central  government. 
The  people  are  subject  to  both  governments.  The  new 
creation  is  in  no  respect  federal  in  its  operation,  although 
it  is  in  some  respects  federal  in  its  organization.  No  one 
of  the  three  basic  principles  constituting  the  great  invention 
was  seriously  questioned  in  the  Convention.  Its  mighty 
and  immortal  task  involved  only  their  adaptation  to  very 
difficult  and  complex  political  conditions.  The  inventor 
of  the  plan  stands  to  the  members  of  the  Convention  as  an 
architect  stands  to  master  builders. 

As  an  evidence  of  the  highly  practical  temper  of  Pelatiah 
Webster  the  fact  should  be  mentioned  in  conclusion  that, 
having  been  a  successful  merchant,  his  pet  hobby  seems  to 
have  been  to  create  a  Department  of  Commerce  in  close 
touch  with  Congress .     He  said :  "I  therefore  humbly  propose , 
if  the  merchants  in  the  several  States  are  disposed  to  send 
delegates  from  their  body,  to  meet  and  attend  the  sitting 
of  Congress,  that  they  shall  be  permitted  to  form  a  chamber 
of  commerce,  and  their  advice  to  Congress  be  demanded  and 
admitted  concerning  all  bills  before  Congress,  as  far  as  the 
same  may  affect  the  trade  of  the  States/'     In  his  criticisms 
made  in  1791  of  the  work  of  the  Federal  Convention  he  said 
that  its  failure  to  accept  that  suggestion  was  a  great  mistake. 
The  very  recent  creation  of  a  Department  of  Commerce 
and  Labor  has  at  last  effectuated  his  idea.    Only  through 
the  vista  of  receding  years  can  such  an  epoch-making  mind 
be  viewed  in  all  its  grandeur.     What  signifies  a  century  of 
neglect  passed   in  the  midst  of  the   "momentous   conse- 
quences" his  mxighty  work  has  wrought!     His  time  is  at 
hand;  his  fame  is  as  safe  and  as  certain  as  the  immortality 


19 

of  thought  and  the  unerring  justice  of  the  tribunal  of  history. 
His  abiding  faith  in  the  justice  of  that  tribunal  he  clearly 
expressed  when  he  said:  "But  if  any  of  these  questions 
should  in  future  time  become  objects  of  discussion,  neither 
the  vast  dignity  of  the  Convention,  nor  the  low  unnoticed 
state  of  myself,  will  be  at  all  considered  in  the  debates; 
the  merits  of  the  matter,  and  the  interests  connected  with  or 
arising  out  of  it  will  alone  dictate  the  decision."  The 
humanly  impossible  and  miraculous  theory  which  has 
heretofore  serenely  assumed  that  the  greatest  and  most 
unique  of  all  political  inventions  had  no  inventor,  cannot 
survive  a  method  of  historical  investigatione  that  under- 
takes to  demonstrate  that  beneath  every  shell  there  is  an 
animal,  behind  every  document  there  is  a  man.  The  emi- 
nent French  critic  and  historian  Ch.  V.  Langlais  has  said: 
*'  History  is  studied  from  documents.  Documents  are  the 
traces  which  have  been  left  by  the  thoughts  and  actions 
of  men  of  former  times.  There  is  no  substitute  for  docu- 
ments: no  documents,  no  history."  Strange  indeed  it  is 
that  the  most  important  document  connected  with  our 
Constitutional  history  should  now  be  presented  to  the 
jurists  and  statesmen  of  the  United  States  as  if  it  were  a 
papyrus  from  Egypt  or  Herculaneum. 


III. 

THE  EPOCH=MAKINQ  DOCUMENT  OF  FEBRUARY  16,  1783, 
IN  WHICH  IS  EMBODIED  THE  FIRST  DRAFT  OF  THE 
EXISTING  CONSTITUTION  OF  THE  UNITED  STATES: 

A 

DISSERTATION 

O  N    T  H  E 

POLITICAL    UNION 

AND 

CONSTITUTION 

O  F   T  H  E 

THIRTEEN    UNITED    STATES 

O  F 

NOR  T  H   A  M  ERI  C  A, 

which  is  necessary  to  their  Preservatio?i  and  Happiness ; 
humbly  offered  to  the  Public. 

{First  published  in  Philadelphia,  1783.) 

I.  The  supreme  authority  of  any  State  must  have  power 
enough  to  efifect  the  ends  of  its  appointment,  otherwise 
these  ends  cannot  be  answered,  and  effectually  secured; 
at  best  they  are  precarious. — But  at  the  same  time, 

II.  The  supreme  authority  ought  to  be  so  limited  and 
checked,  if  possible,  as  to  prevent  the  abuse  of  power,  or 
the  exercise  of  powers  that  are  not  necessary  to  the  ends 
of  its  appointment,  but  hurtful  and  oppressive  to  the  sub- 
ject; but  to  limit  a  supreme  authority  so  far  as  to  diminish 
its  dignity,  or  lessen  its  power  of  doing  good,  would  be  to 
destroy  or  at  least  to  corrupt  it,  and  render  it  ineffectual 
to  its  ends. 


21 

III.  A  number  of  sovereign  States  uniting  into  one 
Commonwealth,  and  appointing  a  supreme  power  to  manage 
the  affairs  of  the  Union,  do  necessarily  and  unavoidably 
part  with  and  transfer  over  to  such  supreme  power,  so 
much  of  their  own  sovereignty  as  is  necessary  to  render 
the  ends  of  the  union  effectual,  otherwise  their  confedera- 
^  tion  will  be  an  union  without  bands  of  union,  like  a  cask 
without  hoops,  that  may  and  probably  will  fall  to  pieces, 
as  soon  as  it  is  put  to  any  exercise  which  requires  strength. 

In  like  manner,  every  member  of  civil  society  parts 
with  many  of  his  natural  rights,  that  he  may  enjoy  the  rest 
in  greater  security  under  the  protection  of  society. 

The  Union  of  the  Thirteen  States  of  America  is  of  mighty 
consequence  to  the  security,  sovereignty,  and  even  liberty  of 
each  of  them,  and  of  all  the  individuals  who  compose  them; 
united  under  a  natural,  well  adjusted,  and  eft'ectual  Consti- 
tution, they  are  a  strong,  rich,  growing  power,  with  great 
resources  and  means  of  defence,  which  no  foreign  power 
will  easily  attempt  to  invade  or  insult;  they  may  easily 
command  respect. 

As  their  exports  are  mostly  either  raw  materials  or 
provisions,  and  their  imports  mostly  finished  goods,  their 
trade  becomes  a  capital  object  with  every  manufacturing 
nation  of  Europe,  and  all  the  southern  colonies  of  America ; 
their  friendship  and  trade  will  of  course  be  courted,  and 
each  power  in  amity  with  them  will  contribute  to  their 
security. 

Their  union  is  of  great  moment  in  another  respect;  they 
thereby  form  a  superintending  power  among  themselves, 
that  can  moderate  and  terminate  disputes  that  may  arise 
between  different  States,  restrain  intestine  violence,  and 
prevent  any  recourse  to  the  dreadful  decision  of  the  sword. 

I  do  not  mean  here  to  go  into  a  detail  of  all  the  advantages 
of  our  union ;  they  offer  themselves  on  every  view,  and 
are  important  enough  to  engage  every  honest,  prudent 
mind,  to  secure  and  establish  that  union  by  every  possible 
method,  that  we  may  enjoy  the  full  benefit  of  it,  and  be 
rendered  happy  and  safe  under  the  protection  it  affords. 

This  union,  however  important,  cannot  be  supported 
without  a  Constitution  founded  on  principles  of  natural 
truth,  fitness,  and  utility.  If  there  is  one  article  wrong 
in  such  Constitution,  it  will  discover  itself  in  practice,  by 
its  baleful  operation,  and  destroy  or  at  least  injure  the 
union. 

Many  nations  have  been  ruined  by  the  errors  of  their 


22 

political  constitutions.  Such  errors  first  introduce  wrongs 
and  injuries,  which  soon  breed  discontents,  which  grad- 
ually work  up  into  mortal  hatred  and  resentments;  hence 
inveterate  parties  are  formed,  which  of  course  make  the 
whole  community  a  house  divided  against  itself,  which 
soon  falls  either  a  prey  to  some  enemies  without,  who 
watch  to  devour  them,  or  else  crumble  into  their  original 
constituent  parts,  and  lose  all  respectability,  strength, 
and  security. 

It  is  as  physically  impossible  to  secure  to  civil  society, 
good  cement  of  union,  duration,  and  security,  without  a 
Constitution  founded  on  principles  of  natural  fitness  and 
right,  as  to  raise  timbers  into  a  strong,  compact  building, 
which  have  not  been  f ram.ed  upon  true  geometric  principles ; 
for  if  you  cut  one  beam  a  foot  too  long  or  too  short,  not  all 
the  authority  and  all  the  force  of  all  the  carpenters  can  ever 
get  it  into  its  place,  and  make  it  fit  with  proper  symmetry 
there. 

As  the  fate  then  of  all  governments  depends  much  upon 
their  political  constitutions,  they  become  an  object  of 
mighty  moment  to  the  happiness  and  well-being  of  society; 
and  as  the  framing  of  such  a  Constitution  requires  great 
knowledge  of  the  rights  of  men  and  societies,  as  well  as  of 
the  interests,  circumstances,  and  even  prejudices  of  the 
several  parts  of  the  community  or  commonwealth,  for  which 
it  is  intended;  it  becomes  a  very  complex  subject,  and  of 
course  requires  great  steadiness  and  comprehension  of 
thought,  as  well  as  great  knowledge  of  men  and  things, 
to  do  it  properly.  I  shall,  however,  attempt  it  with  my 
best  abilities,  and  hope  from  the  candor  of  the  public  to 
escape  censure,  if  I  cannot  merit  praise. 

I  begin  with  my  first  and  great  principle,  viz. :  That  the 
Constitution  must  vest  powers  in  every  department  suffi- 
cient to  secure  and  make  effectual  the  ends  of  it.  The 
supreme  authority  must  have  the  power  of  making  war 
and  peace — of  appointing  armies  and  navies — of  appointing 
officers  both  civil  and  military — of  making  contracts — 
of  emitting,  coining,  and  borrowing  m.oney — of  regulating 
trade — of  making  treaties  with  foreign  powers — of  estab- 
lishing postoffices — and  in  short  of  doing  ever}^thing  which 
the  well-being  of  the  Commonwealth  may  require,  and 
which  is  not  compatible  to  any  particular  State,  all  of 
which  require  money,  and  cannot  possibly  be  made  effectual 
without  it. 

They  must  therefore  of  necessity  be  vested  with  a  power 


y 


l^ 


^ 


23 

of  taxation.  I  know  this  is  a  most  important  and  weighty 
truth,  a  dreadful  engine  of  oppression,  tyranny,  and  injury, 
when  ill  used;  yet,  from  the  necessity  of  the  case,  it  must 
be  admitted. 

P'or  to  give  a  supreme  authority  a  power  of  making 
contracts,  without  any  power  of  payment — of  appointing 
officers  civil  and  military,  without  money  to  pay  them — 
a  power  to  build  ships,  without  any  money  to  do  it  with — 
a  power  of  emitting  money,  without  any  power  to  redeem 
it — or  of  borrowing  money,  without  any  power  to  make 
payment,  etc.,  etc. — such  solecisms  in  government  are  so 
nugatory  and  absurd,  that  I  really  think  to  offer  further 
argument  on  the  subject,  would  be  to  insult  the  under- 
standing of  my  readers. 

To  make  all  these  paym.ents  dependent  on  the  votes 
of  thirteen  popular  assemblies,  who  will  undertake  to  judge 
of  the  propriety  of  every  contract  and  every  occasion  of 
money,  and  grant  or  withhold  supplies,  according  to  their 
opinion,  whilst  at  the  same  time  the  operations  of  the  whole 
may  be  stopped  by  the  vote  of  a  single  one  of  them,  is 
absurd ;  for  this  renders  all  supplies  so  precarious  and  the 
public  credit  so  extremely  uncertain,  as  must  in  its  nature 
render  all  efforts  in  war,  and  all  regular  administration 
in  peace,  utterly  impractical,  as  well  as  most  pointedly 
ridiculous.  Is  there  a  man  to  be  found,  who  would  lend 
money,  or  render  personal  services,  or  make  contracts  on 
such  precarious  security?  Of  this  we  have  a  proof  of  fact, 
the  strongest  of  all  proofs,  a  fatal  experience,  the  surest 
tho'  severest  of  all  dem.onstration,  which  renders  all  other 
proof  or  argument  on  this  subject  quite  unnecessary. 

The  present  broken  state  of  our  finances — public  debts 
and  bankruptcies — enormous  and  ridiculous  depreciation 
of  public  securities — with  the  total  annihilation  of  our 
public  credit — prove  beyond  all  contradiction  the  vanity 
of  all  recourse  to  the  federal  Assemblies  of  the  States.  The 
recent  instance  of  the  duty  of  5  per  cent,  on  imported  goods, 
struck  dead,  and  the  bankruptcies  which  ensued  on  the 
single  vote  of  Rhode  Island,  affords  another  proof  of  what 
it  is  certain  may  be  done  again  in  like  circumstances. 

I  have  another  reason  why  a  power  of  taxation  or  of 
raising  money,  ought  to  be  vested  in  the  supreme  authority 
of  our  commonwealth,  viz.,  the  monies  necessary  for  the 
public  ought  to  be  raised  by  a  duty  imposed  on  imported 
goods ,  not  a  bare  5  per  cent,  or  any  other  per  cent,  on  all 
imported   goods  indiscriminately,  but  a  duty  much  heavier 


24 

on  all  articles  of  luxury  or  mere  ornament,  and  which  are 
consumed  principally  by  the  rich  or  prodigal  part  of  the 
community,  such  as  silks  of  all  sorts,  muslins,  cambricks, 
lawns,  superfine  cloths,  spirits,  wines,  etc.,  etc. 

Such  an  impost  would  ease  the  husbandman,  the  mechanic, 
and  the  poor;  would  have  all  the  practical  effects  of  a 
sumptuary  law;  would  mend  the  economy,  and  increase 
the  industry,  of  the  community;  would  be  collected  without 
the  shocking  circumstances  of  collectors  and  their  warrants ; 
and  make  the  quantity  of  tax  paid,  always  depend  on  the 
choice  of  the  person  who  pays  it. 

This  tax  can  be  laid  by  the  supreme  authority  much  more 
conveniently  than  by  the  particular  Assemblies,  and  would 
in  no  case  be  subject  to  their  repeals  or  modifications; 
and  of  course  the  public  credit  would  never  be  dependent 
on,  or  liable  to  bankruptcy  by  the  humors  of  any  particular 
Assembly. — In  an  Essay  on  Finance,  which  I  design  soon 
to  offer  to  the  public,  this  subject  will  be  treated  more 
fully.  (See  my  Sixth  Essay  on  Free  Trade  and  Finance, 
p.  229.) 

The  delegates  which  are  to  form  that  august  body,  which 
are  to  hold  and  exercise  the  supreme  authority,  ought  to  be 
appointed  by  the  States  in  any  manner  they  please;  in 
which  they  should  not  be  limited  by  any  restrictions; 
their  own  dignity  and  the  weight  they  will  hold  in  the  great 
public  councils,  will  always  depend  on  the  abilities  of  the 
persons  they  appoint  to  represent  them  there;  and  if  they 
are  wise  enough  to  choose  men  of  sufficient  abilities,  and 
respectable  characters,  men  of  sound  sense,  extensive 
knowledge,  gravity,  and  integrity,  they  will  reap  the  honor 
and  advantage  of  such  wisdom. 

But  if  they  are  fools  enough  to  appoint  men  of  trifling 
or  vile  characters,  of  mean  abilities,  faulty  morals,  or  despic- 
able ignorance,  they  must  reap  the  fruits  of  such  folly, 
and  content  themselves  to  have  no  weight,  dignity,  or  esteem 
in  the  public  councils;  and,  what  is  more  to  be  lamented 
by  the  Commonwealth,  to  do  no  good  there. 

I  have  no  objection  to  the  States  electing  and  recalling 
their  delegates  as  often  as  they  please,  but  think  it  hard 
and  very  injurious  both  to  them  and  the  Commonwealth, 
that  they  should  be  obliged  to  discontinue  them  after 
three  years'  service,  if  they  find  them  on  that  trial  to  be 
men  of  sufficient  integrity  and  abilities;  a  man  of  that 
experience  is  certainly  much  more  qualified  to  serve  in  the 
place,  than  a  new  member  of  equal  good  character  can  be; 


25 

experience  makes  perfect  in  every  kind  of  business — old, 
experienced  statesmen,  of  tried  and  approved  integrity 
and  abilities,  are  a  great  blessing  to  a  State — they  acquire 
great  authority  and  esteem  as  well  as  wisdom,  and  very 
much  contribute  to  keep  the  system  of  government  in  good 
and  salutary  order;  and  this  furnishes  the  strongest  reason 
why  they  should  be  continued  in  the  service,  on  Plato's 
great  maxim,  that  "the  man  best  qualified  to  serve,  ought 
to  be  appointed." 

I  am  sorry  to  see  a  contrary  maxim  adopted  in  our  Ameri- 
can counsels ;  to  make  the  highest  reason  that  can  be  given 
for  continuing  a  man  in  the  public  administration,  assigned 
as  a  constitutional  and  absolute  reason  for  turning  him  out, 
seems  to  me  to  be  a  solecism  of  a  piece  with  many  other 
reforms,  by  which  we  set  out  to  surprise  the  world  with 
our  wisdom^. 

If  we  should  adopt  this  maxim  in  the  common  affairs 
of  life,  it  would  be  found  inconvenient,  e.  g.,  if  we  should 
make  it  a  part  of  our  Constitution,  that  a  man  who  has 
served  a  three  years'  apprenticeship  to  the  trade  of  a  tailor 
or  shoemaker,  should  be  obliged  to  discontinue  that  business 
for  the  three  successive  years,  I  am  of  opinion  the  country 
would  soon  be  cleared  of  good  shoemakers  and  tailors. — 
Men  are  no  more  born  statesmen  than  shoemakers  or  tailors 
— Experience  is  equally  necessary  to  perfection  in  both. 

It  seems  to  me  that  a  man 's  inducement  to  qualify  him- 
self for  a  public  employment,  and  make  himself  master  of  it, 
must  be  much  discouraged  by  this  consideration,  that  let 
him  take  whatever  pains  to  qualify  himself  in  the  best 
manner,  he  must  be  shortly  turned  out,  and  of  course  it 
would  be  of  more  consequence  to  him,  to  turn  his  attention 
to  some  other  business,  which  he  might  adopt  when  his 
present  appointment  should  expire;  and  by  this  means 
the  Commonwealth  is  in  danger  of  losing  the  zeal,  industry, 
and  shining  abilities,  as  well  as  services,  of  their  most  accom- 
plished and  valuable  men. 

I  hear  that  the  State  of  Georgia  has  improved  on  this 
blessed  principle,  and  limited  the  continuance  of  their 
governors  to  one  year;  the  consequence  is, they  have  already 
the  ghosts  of  departed  governors  stalking  about  in  every 
part  of  their  State,  and  growing  more  plenty  every  year; 
and  as  the  price  of  everything  is  reduced  by  its  plenty,  I 
can  suppose  governors  will  soon  be  very  low  there.    • 

This  doctrine  of  rotation  was  first  proposed  by  some 
^     sprightly   geniuses   of   brilliant   politics,    with   this    cogent 


26 

reason;  that  by  introducing  a  rotation  in  the  public  offices, 
we  should  have  a  great  number  of  men  trained  up  to  public 
service ;  but  it  appears  to  me  that  it  will  be  more  likely  to 
produce  many  jacks  at  all  trades,  but  good  at  none. 

I  think  that  frequent  elections  are  a  sufficient  security 
against  the  continuance  of  men  in  public  office  whose  con- 
duct is  not  approved,  and  there  can  be  no  reason  for  exclud- 
ing those  whose  conduct  is  approved,  and  who  are  allowed 
to  be  better  qualified  than  any  men  who  can  be  found  to 
suppty  their  places. 

Another  great  object  of  government,  is  the  apportionment 
of  burdens  and  benefits;  for  if  a  greater  quota  of  burden, 
or  a  less  quota  of  benefits  than  is  just  and  right,  be  allotted 
to  any  State,  this  ill  apportionment  Mdll  be  an  everlasting 
source  of  uneasiness  and  discontent.  In  the  first  case, 
the  overburdened  State  will  com.plain;  in  the  last  case,  all 
the  States,  whose  quota  of  benefit  is  under-rated,  will  be 
uneasy;  and  this  is  a  case  of  such  delicacy,  that  it  cannot 
be  safely  trusted  to  the  arbitrary  opinion  or  judgment 
of  any  body  of  men  however  august. 

Some  natural  principles  of  confessed  equity,  and  which 
can  be  reduced  to  a  certainty,  ought,  if  possible,  to  be  found 
and  adopted ;  for  it  is  of  the  highest  moment  to  the  Comim.on- 
wealth,  to  obviate,  and,  if  possible,  wholly  to  take  away, 
such  a  fruitful  and  common  source  of  infinite  disputes, 
as  that  of  apportionment  of  quotas  has  ever  proved  in  all 
States  of  the  earth. 

The  value  of  lands  may  be  a  good  rule;  but  the  ascer- 
tainment of  that  value  is  impracticable;  no  assessm.ent  can 
be  made  which  will  not  be  liable  to  exception  and  debate — 
to  adopt  a  good  rule  in  anything  which  is  impracticable, 
is  absurd;  for  it  is  physically  impossible  that  anything 
should  be  good  for  practise,  which  cannot  be  practised  at 
all ;  but  if  the  value  of  lands  was  capable  of  certain  assess- 
ment, yet  to  adopt  that  value  as  a  rule  of  apportionment 
of  quotas,  and  at  the  same  time  to  except  from  valuation 
large  tracts  of  sundry  States  of  immense  value,  which  have 
all  been  defended  by  the  joint  arms  of  the  whole  Empire, 
and  for  the  defence  of  which  no  additional  quota  of  supply 
is  to  be  demanded  of  those  States,  to  whom  such  lands 
are  secured  by  such  joint  efi"orts  of  the  States,  is  in  its  nature 
unreasonable,  and  will  open  a  door  for  great  complaint. 

It  is  plain  without  argument,  that  such  States  ought 
either  to  make  grants  to  the  Commonwealth  of  such  tracts 
of  defended  territory,  or  sell  as  much  of  them  as  will  pay 


27 

their  proper  quota  of  defence,  and  pay  such  sums  into  the 
pubUc  treasur}^;  and  this  ought  to  be  done,  let  what  rule 
of  quota  forever  be  adopted  with  respect  to  the  cultivated 
part  of  the  United  States;  for  no  proposition  of  natural 
right  and  justice  can  be  plainer  than  this,  that  every  part 
of  valuable  property  which  is  defended,  ought  to  contribute 
its  quota  of  supply  for  that  defence. 

If  then  the  value  of  cultivated  lands  is  found  to  be  an 
impracticable  rule  of  apportionment  of  quotas,  we  have  to 
seek  for  some  other,  equally  just  and  less  exceptionable. 

It  appears  to  me,  that  the  num.ber  of  living  souls  or 
hum^an  persons  of  whatever  age,  sex,  or  condition,  will 
afford  us  a  rule  or  measure  of  apportionment  which  wiU 
forever  increase  and  decrease  with  the  real  wealth  of  the 
States,  and  wiU  of  course  be  a  perpetual  rule,  not  capable 
of  corruption  by  any  circumstances  of  future  time;  which 
is  of  vast  consideration  in  forming  a  constitution  which  is 
designed  for  perpetual  duration,  and  which  will  in  its  nature 
be  as  just  as  to  the  inhabited  parts  of  each  State,  as  that 
of  the  value  of  lands,  or  any  other  that  has  or  can  be  micn- 
tioned. 

Land  takes  its  value  not  merely  from  the  goodness  of 
its  soil,  but  from  innumerable  other  relative  advantages 
among  v/hich  the  population  of  the  country  may  be  con- 
sidered as  principal;  as  lands  in  a  full  settled  country  will 
always  (cseteris  paribus)  bring  more  than  lands  in  thin 
settlements.  On  this  principle,  when  the  inhabitants  of 
Russia,  Poland,  etc.,  sell  real  estates,  they  do  not  value 
them  as  we  do,  by  the  number  of  acres,  but  by  the  number 
of  people  who  live  on  them. 

Where  any  piece  of  land  has  many  advantages,  many 
people  will  crowd  there  to  obtain  them ;  which  will  create 
many  competitors  for  the  purchase  of  it;  which  will  of 
course  raise  the  price.  Where  there  are  fewer  advantages, 
there  will  be  fewer  com.petitors,  and  of  course  a  less  price; 
and  these  two  things  v/ill  forever  be  proportionate  to  each 
other,  and  of  course  the  one  will  always  be  a  sure  index  of 
the  other. 

The  only  considerable  objection  I  have  ever  heard  to 
this,  is,  that  the  quality  of  inhabitants  differs  in  the  different 
States,  and  it  is  not  reasonable  that  the  black  slaves  in  the 
southern  States  should  be  estimated  on  a  par  with  the 
white  freemen  in  the  northern  States.  To  discuss  this 
question  fairly,  I  think  it  will  be  just  to  estimate  the  neat 
value  of  the  labor  of  both;  and  if  it  shall  appear  that  the 


28 

labor  of  the  black  person  produces  as  much  neat  wealth 
to  the  southern  State,  as  the  labor  of  the  white  person  does 
to  the  northern  State,  I  think  it  will  follow  plainly  that  they 
are  equally  useful  inhabitants  in  point  of  wealth ;  and  there- 
fore in  the  case  before  us,  should  be  estimated  alike. 

And  if  the  amazing  profits  which  the  southern  planters 
boast  of  receiving  from  the  labor  of  their  slaves  on  their 
plantations,  are  real,  the  southern  people  have  greatly  the 
advantage  in  this  kind  of  estimation,  and  as  this  objection 
comes  principally  from  the  southward,  I  should  suppose 
that  the  gentlemen  from  that  part  would  blush  to  urge  it 
any  farther. 

That  the  supreme  authority  should  be  vested  with  powers 
to  terminate  and  finally  decide  controversies  arising  be- 
tween different  States,  I  take  it,  will  be  universally  admitted, 
but  I  humbly  apprehend  that  an  appeal  from  the  first 
instance  of  trial  ought  to  be  admitted  in  causes  of  great 
moment,  on  the  same  reasons  that  such  appeals  are  admitted 
in  all  the  States  of  Europe.  It  is  well  known  to  all  men 
versed  in  courts,  that  the  first  hearing  of  a  cause  rather 
gives  an  opening  to  that  evidence  and  reason  which  ought 
to  decide  it,  than  such  a  full  examination  and  thorough 
discussion,  as  should  always  precede  a  final  judgment,  in 
causes  of  national  consequence.  A  detail  of  reasons  might 
be  added,  which  I  deem  it  unnecessary  to  enlarge  on  here. 

The  supreme  authority  ought  to  have  a  power  of  peace 
and  war,  and  forming  treaties  and  alliances  with  all  foreign 
powers ;  which  implies  a  necessity  of  their  also  having  suffi- 
cient powers  to  enforce  the  obedience  of  all  subjects  of  the 
United  States  to  such  treaties  and  alliances;  with  full 
powers  to  unite  the  force  of  the  States ;  and  direct  its  opera- 
tions in  war;  and  to  punish  all  transgressors  in  all  these 
respects;  otherwise,  by  the  imprudence  of  a  few,  the  whole 
Commonwealth  may  be  embroiled  with  foreign  powers, 
and  the  operations  of  war  may  be  rendered  useless,  or  fail 
much  of  their  due  effect. 

All  these  I  conceive  will  be  easily  granted,  especially  the 
latter,  as  the  power  of  Congress  to  appoint  and  direct  the 
army  and  navy  in  war,  with  all  departments  thereto  belong- 
ing, and  punishing  delinquents  in  them  all,  is  already 
admitted  into  practise  in  the  course  of  the  present  unhappy 
war,  in  which  we  have  been  long  engaged. 

II.  But  -now  the  great  and  most  difficult  part  of  this 
weighty  subject  remains  to  be  considered,  viz.,  how  these 
supreme  powers  are  to  be  constituted  in  such  manner  that 


29 

they  may  be  able  to  exercise  with  full  force  and  effect,  the 
vast  authorities  committed  to  them,  for  the  good  and  well- 
being  of  the  United  States,  and  yet  be  so  checked  and  re- 
strained from  exercising  them  to  the  injury  and  ruin  of  the 
States,  that  we  may  with  safety  trust  them  with  a  commis- 
sion of  such  vast  magnitude — and  may  Almighty  wisdom 
direct  my  pen  in  this  arduous  discussion. 

I.  The  men  who  compose  this  important  council,  must 
be  delegated  from  all  the  States;  and,  of  course,  the  hope 
of  approbation  and  continuance  of  honors,  will  naturally 
stimulate  them  to  act  right,  and  to  please;  the  dread  of 
censure  and  disgrace  will  naturally  operate  as  a  check  to 
restrain  them  from  improper  behavior :  but  however  natural 
and  forcible  these  motives  may  be,  we  find  by  sad  experience, 
they  are  not  always  strong  enough  to  produce  the  effects 
we  expect  and  wish  from  them. 

It  is  to  be  wished  that  none  might  be  appointed  that 
were  not  fit  and  adequate  to  this  weighty  business;  but  a 
little  knowledge  of  human  nature,  and  a  little  acquaintance 
with  the  political  history  of  mankind,  will  soon  teach  us 
that  this  is  not  to  be  expected. 

The  representatives  appointed  by  popular  elections  are 
commonly  not  only  the  legal,  but  real,  substantial  repre- 
sentatives of  their  electors,  i.  e.,  there  will  commonly  be 
about  the  same  proportion  of  grave,  sound,  well-qualified 
men,  trifling,  desultory  men — wild  or  knavish  schemers, 
— and  dull,  ignorant  fools,  in  the  delegated  assembly,  as 
in  the  body  of  electors. 

I  know  of  no  way  to  help  this;  such  delegates  must  be 
admitted,  as  the  States  are  pleased  to  send;  and  all  that  can 
be  done  is,  when  they  get  together,  to  make  the  best  of  them. 

We  will  suppose  then  they  are  all  met  in  Congress,  clothed 
with  that  vast  authority  which  is  necessary  to  the  well- 
being,  and  even  existence,  of  the  union,  that  they  should  be 
vested  with ;  how  shall  we  empower  them  to  do  all  necessary 
and  effectual  good,  and  restrain  them  from  doing  hurt? 
To  do  this  properly,  I  think  we  must  recur  to  those  natural 
motives  of  action,  those  feelings  and  apprehensions,  which 
usually  occur  to  the  mind  at  the  very  time  of  action;  for 
distant  consequences,  however  weighty,  are  often  too  much 
disregarded. 

Truth  loves  light,  and  is  vindicated  by  it.  Wrong  shrouds 
itself  in  darkness,  and  is  supported  by  delusion.  An  honest 
well-qualified  man  loves  light,  can  bear  close  examination, 
and  critical  inquiry,  and  is  best  pleased  when  he  is  most 


30 

thoroughly  understood:  a  man  of  corrupt  design,  or  a  fool 
of  no  design,  hates  close  examination  and  critical  inquiry; 
the  knavery  of  the  one,  and  the  ignorance  of  the  other,  are 
discovered  by  it,  and  they  both  usually  grow  uneasy,  before 
the  investigation  is  half  done.  I  do  not  believe  that  there 
is  a  more  natural  truth  in  the  world,  than  that  divine  one 
of  our  Saviour,  "he  that  doth  truth,  cometh  to  the  light." 
I  would  therefore  recommend  that  mode  of  deliberation, 
which  will  naturally  bring  on  the  most  thorough  and  critical 
discussion  of  the  subject,  previous  to  passing  any  act;  and 
for  that  purpose  humbly  propose, 

2.  That  the  Congress  shall  consist  of  two  chambers, 
an  upper  and  a  lower  house,  or  senate  and  commons,  with 
the  concurrence  of  both  necessary  to  every  act;  and  that 
every  State  send  one  or  more  delegates  to  each  house:  this 
^  will  subject  every  act  to  two  discussions  before  two  dis- 
tinct chambers  of  men  equally  qualified  for  the  debate, 
equally  masters  of  the  subject,  and  of  equal  authority  in 
the  decision. 

These  two  houses  will  be  governed  by  the  same  natural 
motives  and  interests,  viz.,  the  good  of  the  Commonwealth, 
and  the  approbation  of  the  people.  Whilst  at  the  same 
time,  the  emulation  naturally  arising  between  them,  will 
induce  a  very  critical  and  sharp-sighted  inspection  into  the 
motions  of  each  other.  Their  different  opinions  will  bring 
on  conferences  between  the  two  houses,  in  which  the  whole 
subject  will  be  exhausted  in  arguments  pro  and  con,  and 
shame  will  be  the  portion  of  obstinate  convicted  error. 

Under  these  circumstances,  a  man  of  ignorance  or  evil 
design  will  be  afraid  to  impose  on  the  credulity,  inattention, 
or  confidence  of  his  house,  by  introducing  any  corrupt  or 
undigested  proposition,  which  he  knows  he  must  be  called 
on  to  defend  against  the  severe  scrutiny  and  poignant 
objections  of  the  other  house.  I  do  not  believe  the  many 
hurtful  and  foolish  legislative  acts  which  first  or  last  have 
injured  all  the  States  on  earth,  have  originated  so  much  in 
corruption  as  indolence,  ignorance,  and  a  want  of  a  full 
comprehension  of  the  subject,  which  a  full,  prying  and 
emulous  discussion  would  tend  in  a  great  measure  to  remove: 
this  naturally  rouses  the  lazy  and  idle,  who  hate  the  pain 
of  close  thinking ;  animates  the  ambitious  to  excel  in  policy 
and  argument ;  and  excites  the  whole  to  support  the  dignity 
of  their  house,  and  vindicate  their  own  propositions. 

I  am  not  of  opinion  that  bodies  of  elective  men,  which 
usually  compose  Parliaments,  Diets,  Assemblies,  Congresses, 


31 

etc.,  are  commonly  dishonest  but  I  believe  it  rarely  happens 
that  there  are  not  designing  men  among  them;  and  I 
think  it  would  be  much  more  difficult  for  them  to  unite 
their  partisans  in  two  houses,  and  corrupt  or  deceive  them 
both,  than  to  carry  on  their  designs  where  there  is  but  one 
unalarmed,  unapprehensive  house  to  be  managed;  and  as 
there  is  no  hope  of  making  these  bad  men  good,  the  best 
policy  is  to  embarrass  them,  and  make  their  work  as  diffi- 
cult as  possible. 

In  these  assemblies  are  frequently  to  be  found  sanguine 
men,  upright  enough  indeed,  but  of  strong,  wild  projection, 
whose  brains  are  always  teeming  with  Utopian,  chimerical 
plans,  and  political  whims,  very  destructive  to  society.  I 
hardly  know  a  greater  evil  than  to  have  the  supreme  council 
of  a  Nation  played  off  on  such  men's  wires,  such  baseless 
visions  at  best  end  in  darkness,  and  the  dance,  though  easy 
and  merry  enough  at  first,  rarely  fails  to  plunge  the  cred- 
ulous, simple  followers  into  sloughs  and  bogs  at  last. 

Nothing  can  tend  more  effectually  to  obviate  these  evils, 
and  to  mortify  and  cure  such  maggoty  brains,  than  to  see 
the  absurdity  of  their  projects  exposed  by  the  several  argu- 
ments and  keen  satire  which  a  full,  emulous,  and  spirited 
discussion  of  the  subject  will  naturally  produce:  we  have 
had  enough  of  these  geniuses  in  the  short  course  of  our 
politics,  both  in  our  national  and  provincial  councils,  and 
have  felt  enough  of  their  evil  effects,  to  induce  us  to  wish 
for  any  good  method  to  keep  ourselves  clear  of  them  in 
future. 

The  consultations  and  decisions  of  national  councils  are 
so  very  important,  that  the  fate  of  millions  depends  on  them ; 
therefore  no  man  ought  to  speak  in  such  assemblies,  without 
considering  that  the  fate  of  millions  hangs  on  his  tongue, 
— and  of  course  a  man  can  have  no  right  in  such  august 
councils  to  utter  undigested  sentiments,  or  indulge  himself 
in  sudden,  unexamined  flights  of  thought;  his  most  tried 
and  improved  abilities  are  due  to  the  State,  who  have 
trusted  him  with  their  most  important  interests. 

A  man  must  therefore  be  most  inexcusable,  who  is  either 
absent  during  such  debates,  or  sleeps,  or  whispers,  or  catches 
flies  during  the  argument,  and  just  rouses  when  the  vote  is 
called,  to  give  his  yea  or  nay,  to  the  weal  or  woe  of  a  nation. 
Therefore  it  is  manifestly  proper,  that  every  natural  motive 
that  can  operate  on  his  understanding,  or  his  passions,  to 
engage  his  attention  and  utmost  efforts,  should  be  put  in 
practise,  and  that  his  present  feelings  should  be  raised  by 


32 

every  motive  of  honor  and  shame,  to  stimulate  him  to  every 
practicable  degree  of  diligence  and  exertion,  to  be  as  far 
as  possible  useful  in  the  great  discussion. 

I  appeal  to  the  feelings  of  every  reader,  if  he  would  not 
(were  he  in  either  house)  be  much  more  strongly  and  naturally 
induced  to  exert  his  utmost  abilities  and  attention  to  any 
question  which  was  to  pass  through  the  ordeal  of  a  spirited 
discussion  of  another  house,  than  he  would  do,  if  the  abso- 
lute decision  depended  on  his  own  house,  without  any  further 
inquiry  or  challenge  on  the  subject. 

As  Congress  will  ever  be  composed  of  men  delegated  by 
the  several  States,  it  may  well  be  supposed  that  they  have 
the  confidence  of  their  several  States,  and  understand  well 
the  policy  and  present  condition  of  them;  it  may  also  be 
supposed  that  they  come  with  strong  local  attachments, 
and  habits  of  thinking  limited  to  the  interests  of  their  par- 
ticular States;  it  may  therefore  be  supposed  they  will  need 
much  information,  in  order  to  their  gaining  that  enlarge- 
ment of  ideas,  and  great  comprehension  of  thought,  which 
will  be  necessary  to  enable  them  to  think  properly  on  that 
large  scale,  which  takes  into  view  the  interests  of  all  the 
States. 

The  greatest  care  and  wisdom  is  therefore  requisite  to 
give  them  the  best  and  surest  information,  and  of  that  kind 
that  may  be  the  most  safely  relied  on,  to  prevent  their  being 
deluded  or  prejudiced  by  partial  representations,  made  by 
interested  men  who  have  particular  views. 

This  information  may  perhaps  be  best  made  by  the  great 
ministers  of  state,  who  ought  to  be  men  of  the  greatest 
abilities  and  integrity;  their  business  is  confined  to  their 
several  departments,  and  their  attention  engaged  strongly 
and  constantly  to  all  the  several  parts  of  the  same;  the 
whole  arrangement,  method,  and  order  of  which,  are  formed, 
superintended,  and  managed  in  their  offices,  and  all  infor- 
mations relative  to  their  departments  centre  there. 

These  ministers  will  of  course  have  the  best  information, 
and  most  perfect  knowledge,  of  the  state  of  the  Nation,  as 
far  as  it  relates  to  their  several  departments,  and  will  of 
course  be  able  to  give  the  best  information  to  Congress,  in 
what  manner  any  bill  proposed  will  affect  the  public  interest 
in  their  several  departments,  which  will  nearly  comprehend 
the  whole. 

The  Financier  manages  the  whole  subject  of  revenues 
and  expenditures — the  Secretary  of  States  takes  knowledge 
of  the  general  policy  and  internal  government — the  minister 


^ 


33 

of  war  presides  in  the  whole  business  of  war  and  defence — 
and  the  minister  of  foreign  affairs  regards  the  whole  state  of 
the  nation,  as  it  stands  related  to,  or  connected  with,  all 
foreign  powers. 

I  mention  a  Secretary  of  State,  because  all  other  nations 
have  one,  and  I  suppose  we  shall  need  one  as  much  as  they, 
and  the  multiplicity  of  affairs  which  naturally  fall  into  his 
office  will  grow  so  fast,  that  I  imagine  we  shall  soon  be  under 
the  necessity  of  appointing  one. 

To  these  I  would  add  Judges  of  Law,  and  chancery;  but 
I  fear  they  will  not  be  very  soon  appointed — the  one  sup- 
poses the  existence  of  law,  the  other  of  equity — and  when 
we  shall  be  altogether  convinced  of  the  absolute  necessity 
of  the  real  and  effectual  existence  of  both  these,  we  shall 
probably  appoint  proper  heads  to  preside  in  those  depart- 
ments.    I  would  therefore  propose, 

3.  That  when  any  bill  shall  pass  the  second  reading  in 
the  house  in  which  it  originates,  and  before  it  shall  be  finally 
enacted,  copies  of  it  shall  be  sent  to  each  of  the  said  ministers 
of  state,  in  being  at  the  time,  who  shall  give  said  house  in 
writing,  the  fullest  inform.ation  in  their  power,  and  their 
most  explicit  sentiments  of  the  operation  of  the  said  bill  on 
the  public  interest,  as  far  as  relates  to  their  respective 
departments,  which  shall  be  received  and  read  in  said  house, 
and  entered  on  their  minutes,  before  they  finally  pass  the 
bill;  and  when  they  send  the  bill  for  concurrence  to  the 
other  house,  they  shall  send  therewith  the  said  informations 
of  the  said  ministers  of  state,  which  shall  likewise  be  read 
in  that  house  before  their  concurrence  is  finally  passed. 

I  do  not  mean  to  give  these  great  ministers  of  state  a 
negative  on  Congress,  but  I  mean  to  oblige  Congress  to 
receive  their  advices  before  they  pass  their  bills,  and  that 
every  act  shall  be  void  that  is  not  passed  with  these  forms ; 
and  I  further  propose,  that  either  house  of  Congress  may, 
if  they  please,  admit  the  said  ministers  to  be  present  and 
assist  in  the  debates  of  the  house,  but  without  any  right  of 
vote  in  the  decision. 

It  appears  to  me,  that  if  every  act  shall  pass  so  many 
different  corps  of  discussion  before  it  is  completed,  where 
each  of  them  stake  their  characters  on  the  advice  or  vote 
they  give,  there  will  be  all  the  light  thrown  on  the  case, 
which  the  nature  and  circumstances  of  it  can  admit,  and 
any  corrupt  man  will  find  it  extremely  difficult  to  foist  in 
any  erroneous  clause  whatever;  and  every  ignorant  or  lazy 
man  will  find  the  strongest  inducements  to  make  himself 


34 

master  of  the  subject,  that  he  may  appear  with  some  toler- 
able degree  of  character  m  it ;  and  the  whole  will  find  them- 
selves in  a  manner  compelled,  diligently  and  sincerely  to 
seek  for  the  real  state  of  the  facts,  and  the  natural  fitness 
and  truth  arising  from  them,  i.  e.,  the  whole  natural  prin- 
ciples on  which  the  subjects  depend,  and  which  alone  can 
endure  every  test,  to  the  end  that  they  may  have  not  only 
the  inward  satisfaction  of  acting  properly  and  usefully  for 
the  States,  but  also  the  credit  and  character  which  is  or 
ought  ever  to  be  annexed  to  such  a  conduct. 

This  will  give  the  great  laws  of  Congress  the  highest  prob- 
ability, presumption,  and  m.eans  of  right,  fitness,  and  truth, 
that  any  laws  whatever  can  have  at  their  first  enaction 
and  will  of  course  afford  the  highest  reason  for  the  confidence 
and  acquiescence  of  the  States,  and  all  their  subjects,  in 
them;  and  being  grounded  in  truth  and  natural  fitness, 
their  operations  will  be  easy,  salutary,  and  satisfactory. 

If  experience  shall  discover  error  in  any  law  (for  practise 
will  certainly  discover  such  errors,  if  there  be  any)  the 
legislature  will  always  be  able  to  correct  them,  by  such 
repeals,  amendments,  or  new  laws  as  shall  be  found  neces- 
sary; but  as  it  is  much  easier  to  prevent  mischiefs  than  to 
remedy  them,  all  possible  caution,  prudence,  and  attention 
should  be  sued,  to  make  the  laws  right  at  first. 

4.  There  is  another  body  of  men  among  us,  whose  busi- 
ness of  life,  and  whose  full  and  extensive  intelligence,  for- 
eign and  domestic,  naturally  make  them  more  perfectly 
acquainted  with  the  sources  of  our  wealth,  and  whose 
particular  interests  are  more  intimately  and  necessarily 
connected  with  the  general  prosperity  of  the  country,  than 
any  other  order  of  men  in  the  States.  I  mean  the  Merchants ; 
and  I  could  wish  that  Congress  might  have  the  benefit  of 
that  extensive  and  important  information,  which  this  body 
of  m.en  are  very  capable  of  laying  before  them. 

Trade  is  of  such  essential  importance  to  our  interests, 
and  so  intimately  connected  with  all  our  staples,  great  and 
small,  that  no  sources  of  our  wealth  can  flourish,  and  operate 
to  the  general  benefit  of  the  community,  without  it.  Our 
husbandry,  that  great  staple  of  our  country,  can  never 
exceed  our  home  consumption  without  this — it  is  plain  at 
first  sight,  that  the  farmer  will  not  toil  and  sweat  through 
the  year  to  raise  great  plenty  of  the  produce  of  the  soil,  if 
there  is  no  market  for  his  produce,  when  he  has  it  ready 
for  sale,  i.  e.,  if  there  are  no  merchants  to  buy  it. 

In  like  manner,  the  manufacturer  will  not  lay  out  his 


35 


^'     OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY 

OF 


business  on  any  large  scale,  if  there  is  no  merchant  to  buy 
his  fabrics  when  he  has  finished  them ;  a  vent  is  of  the  most 
essential  importance  to  every  manufacturing  country — 
the  merchants,  therefore,  become  the  natural  negotiators  of 
the  wealth  of  the  country,  who  take  off  the  abundance,  and 
supply  the  wants,  of  the  inhabitants; — and  as  this  negotia- 
tion is  the  business  of  their  lives,  and  the  source  of  their 
own  wealth,  they  of  course  become  better  acquainted  with 
both  our  abundance  and  wants,  and  are  more  interested 
in  finding  and  improving  the  best  vent  for  the  one,  and 
supply  of  the  other,  than  any  other  men  among  us,  and  they 
have  a  natural  interest  in  making  both  the  purchase  and 
supply  as  convenient  to  their  customers  as  possible,  that 
they  may  secure  their  custom,  and  thereby  increase  their 
own  business. 

It  follows  then,  that  the  merchants  are  not  only  qualified 
to  give  the  fullest  and  most  important  information  to  our 
supreme  legislature,  concerning  the  state  of  our  trade — 
the  abundance  and  wants — the  wealth  and  poverty,  of  our 
people,  i.  e.,  their  most  important  interests,  but  are  also  the 
most  likely  to  do  it  fairly  and  truly,  and  to  forward  with  their 
influence,  every  measure  which  will  operate  to  the  conveni- 
ence and  benefit  of  our  commerce,  and  oppose  with  their 
whole  weight  and  superior  knowledge  of  the  subject,  any 
wild  schemes,  which  an  ignorant  or  arbitrary  legislature 
may  attempt  to  introduce,  to  the  hurt  and  embarrasment 
of  our  intercourse  both  with  one  another,  and  with  foreigners. 

The  States  of  Venice  and  Holland  have  ever  been  governed 
by  merchants,  or  at  least  their  policy  has  ever  been  under 
the  great  influence  of  that  sort  of  m.en.  No  States  have 
been  better  served,  as  appears  by  their  great  success,  the 
ease  and  happiness  of  their  citizens,  as  well  as  the  strength 
and  riches  of  their  Commonwealths:  the  one  is  the  oldest, 
and  the  other  the  richest.  State  in  the  world  of  equal  number 
of  people — the  one  has  maintained  sundry  wars  with  the 
Grand  Turk— the  other  has  withstood  the  power  of  Spain 
and  France;  and  the  capitals  of  both  have  long  been  the 
principal  marts  of  the  several  parts  of  Europe  in  which  they 
are  vSituated;  and  the  banks  of  both  are  the  best  supported, 
and  in  the  best  credit,  of  any  banks  in  Europe,  though  their 
countries  or  territories  are  very  small,  and  their  inhabitants 
but  a  handful,  when  compared  with  the  great  States  in  their 
neighbourhood. 

Merchants  must,  from  nature  of  the  their  business,  cer- 
tainly understand   the    interests   and    resources    of    their 


36 

country,  the  best  of  any  men  in  it;  and  I  know  not  of  any 
one  reason  why  they  should  be  deemed  less  upright  or 
patriotic,  than  any  other  rank  of  citizen  whatever. 

I  therefore  humbly  propose,  if  the  merchants  in  the 
several  States  are  disposed  to  send  delegates  from  their 
body,  to  meet  and  attend  the  sitting  of  Congress,  that  they 
shall  be  permitted  to  form  a  chamber  of  commerce,  and 
their  advice  to  Congress  be  demanded  and  admitted  con- 
cerning all  bills  before  Congress,  as  far  as  the  same  may 
affect  the  trade  of  the  States. 

I  have  no  idea  that  the  continent  is  made  for  Congress: 
I  take  them  to  be  no  more  than  the  upper  servants  of  the 
great  political  body,  who  are  to  find  out  things  by  study  and 
inquiry  as  other  people  do ;  and  therefore  I  think  it  necessary 
to  place  them  under  the  best  possible  advantages  for  infor- 
mation, and  to  require  them  to  improve  all  those  advan- 
tages, to  qualify  them.selves  in  the  best  manner  possible, 
for  the  wise  and  useful  discharge  of  the  vast  trust  and  mighty 
authority  reposed  in  them ;  and  as  I  conceive  the  advice  of 
the  merchants  to  be  one  of  the  greatest  sources  of  mercantile 
information,  which  is  anywhere  placed  within  their  reach, 
it  ought  by  no  means  to  be  neglected,  but  so  husbanded 
and  improved,  that  the  greatest  possible  advantages  may 
be  derived  from  it. 

Besides  this,  I  have  another  reason  why  the  merchants 
ought  to  be  consulted;  I  take  it  to  be  very  plain  that  the 
husbantry  and  manufactures  of  the  country  must  be  ruined, 
if  the  present  rate  of  taxes  is  continued  on  them  much  longer, 
and  of  course  a  very  great  part  of  our  revenue  must  arise 
from  imposts  on  merchandise,  which  will  fall  directly  within 
the  merchants'  sphere  of  business,  and  of  course  their  con- 
currence and  advice  will  be  of  the  utmost  consequence,  not 
only  to  direct  the  properest  m^ode  of  levying  those  duties, 
but  also  to  get  them  carried  into  quiet  and  peaceable  exe- 
cution. 

No  men  are  more  conversant  with  the  citizens,  or  more 
intimately  connected  with  their  interests,  than  the  mer- 
chants, and  therefore  their  weight  and  influence  will  have  a 
mighty  effect  on  the  minds  of  the  people.  I  do  not  recollect 
an  instance,  in  which  the  Court  of  London  ever  rejected  the 
remonstrances  and  advices  of  the  merchants,  and  did  not 
suffer  severely  for  their  pride.  We  have  some  striking 
instances  of  this  in  the  disregarded  advices  and  remon- 
strances of  very  many  English  merchants  against  the  Ameri- 
can war,  and  their  fears  and  apprehensions  we  see  verified, 
almost  like  prophecies  by  the  event. 


^1 

1  know  nbt  why  I  should  continue  this  argument  any 
longer  or  indeed  why  I  should  have  urged  it  so  long,  in  as 
much  as  I  cannot  conceive  that  Congress  or  anybody  else 
will  deem  it  below  the  dignity  of  the  supreme  power  to  con- 
sult so  important  an  order  of  men,  in  matters  of  the  first 
consequence,  which  fall  immediately  under  their  notice, 
and  in  which  their  experience,  and  of  course  their  knowledge 
and  advice,  are  preferable  to  those  of  any  other  order  of  men. 

Besides  the  benefits  which  Congress  may  receive  from 
this  institution,  a  chamber  of  comm.erce,  composed  of  mem- 
bers from  all  trading  towns  in  the  States,  if  properly  insti- 
tuted and  conducted,  will  produce  very  many,  I  might  almost 
say,  innumerable  advantages  of  singular  utility  to  all  the 
States — it  will  give  dignity,  uniformity,  and  safety  to  our 
trade — establish  the  credit  of  the  bank — secure  the  con- 
fidence of  foreign  merchants — prove  in  very  many  instances 
a  fruitful  source  of  improvement  of  our  staples  and  mutual 
intercourse — correct  m^any  abuses — pacify  discontents — 
unite  us  in  our  interests,  and  thereby  cement  the  general 
union  of  the  whole  Comm.on wealth — will  relieve  Congress 
from  the  pain  and  trouble  of  deciding  many  intricate  ques- 
tions of  trade  which  they  do  not  understand,  by  referring 
them  over  to  this  chamber,  where  they  will  be  discussed  by 
an  order  of  men,  the  most  competent  to  the  business  of  any 
that  can  be  found,  and  most  likely  to  give  a  decision  that 
shall  be  just,  useful,  and  satisfactory. 

It  may  be  objected  to  all  this,  that  the  less  complex  and 
the  more  simple  every  constitution  is,  the  nearer  it  comes 
to  perfection:  this  argument  would  be  very  good,  and 
afford  a  very  forcible  conclusion,  if  the  government  of  men 
was  like  that  of  the  Alm.ighty,  always  founded  on  wisdom, 
knowledge  and  truth;  but  in  the  present  im.perfect  state  of 
human  nature,  where  the  best  of  men  know  but  in  part, 
and  must  recur  to  advice  and  informxation  for  the  rest,  it 
certainly  becomes  necessary  to  form  a  constitution  on  such 
principles,  as  will  secure  that  information  and  advice  in 
the  best  and  surest  manner  possible. 

It  may  be  further  objected  that  the  forms  herein  proposed 
will  embarrass  the  business  of  Congress,  and  make  it  at 
best  slow  and  dilatory.  As  far  as  this  form  will  prevent  the 
hurr>'ing  a  bill  through  the  house  without  due  examination, 
the  objection  itself  becomes  an  advantage — at  most  these 
checks  on  the  supreme  authority  can  have  no  further  eff"ect 
than  to  delay  or  destroy  a  good  bill,  but  cannot  pass  a  bad 
one;  and  I  think  it  much  better  in  the  main,  to  lose  a  good 


38 

bill  than  to  suffer  a  bad  one  to  pass  into  a  law. — Besides  it 
is  not  to  be  supposed  that  clear,  plain  cases  will  meet  with 
embarrassment,  and  it  is  most  safe  that  untried,  doubtful, 
difficult  matters  should  pass  through  the  gravest  and  fullest 
discussion,  before  the  sanction  of  the  law  is  given  to  them. 

But  what  is  to  be  done  if  the  two  houses  grow  jealous 
and  ill-natured,  and  after  all  their  information  and  advice, 
grow  out  of  humor  and  insincere,  and  no  concurrence  can  be 
obtained  ?  I  answer,  sit  still  and  do  nothing  until  they  get 
into  a  better  humor :  I  think  this  is  much  better  than  to  pass 
laws  in  such  a  temper  and  spirit,  as  the  objection  supposes. 

It  is  however  an  ill  compliment  to  so  many  grave  person- 
ages, to  suppose  them  capable  of  throwing  aside  their 
reason,  and  giving  themselves  up  like  children  to  the  control 
of  their  passions;  or,  if  this  should  happen  for  a  moment, 
that  it  should  continue  any  length  of  time,  is  hardly  to  be 
presumed  of  a  body  of  men  placed  in  such  high  stations  of 
dignity  and  importance,  with  the  eyes  of  all  the  world  upon 
them — but  if  they  should,  after  all,  be  capable  of  this,  I 
think  it  madness  to  set  them  to  making  laws,  during  such 
fits — it  is  best,  when  they  are  in  no  condition  to  do  good, 
to  keep  them  from  doing  hurt — and  if  they  do  not  grow 
wiser  in  reasonable  time,  I  know  of  nothing  better,  than  to  be 
ashamed  of  our  old  appointments,  and  make  new  ones. 

But  what  if  the  country  is  invaded,  or  some  other  exigency 
happens,  so  pressing  that  the  safety  of  the  State  requires 
an  immediate  resolution?  I  answer,  what  would  you  do 
if  such  a  case  should  happen,  where  there  was  but  one  house, 
unchecked,  but  equally  divided,  so  that  a  legal  vote  could 
not  be  obtained.  The  matter  is  certainly  equally  difficult 
and  embarrassed  in  both  cases:  but  in  the  case  proposed 
I  know  of  no  better  way  than  that  which  the  Romans 
adopted  on  the  like  occasion,  viz.,  that  both  houses  meet 
in  one  chamber,  and  choose  a  dictator,  who  should  have 
and  exercise  the  whole  power  of  both  houses,  till  such  time 
as  they  should  be  able  to  concur  in  displacing  him,  and  that 
the  whole  power  of  the  two  houses  should  be  suspended  in 
the  mean  time. 

5.  I  further  propose,  that  no  grant  of  money  whatever 
shall  be  made,  without  an  appropriation,  and  that  rigid 
penalties  (no  matter  how  great,  in  my  opinion  the  halter 
would  be  mild  enough)  shall  be  inflicted  on  any  person, 
however  august  his  station,  who  should  give  order,  or  vote 
for  the  payment,  or  actually  pay  one  shilling  of  sucli  money 
to  any  other  purpose  than  that  of  its  appropriation,  and 


39 

that  no  order  whatever  of  any  superior  in  office  shall  justify 
such  payment,  but  every  order  shall  express  what  funds 
it  is  drawn  upon,  and  what  appropriation  it  is  to  be  charged 
to,  or  the  order  shall  not  be  paid. 

This  kind  of  embezzlement  is  of  so  fatal  a  nature,  that 
no  measures  or  bounds  are  to  be  observed  in  curing  it; 
when  ministers  will  set  forth  the  most  specious  and  necessary 
occasions  for  money,  and  induce  the  people  to  pay  it  in 
full  tale;  and  when  they  have  gotten  possession  of  it, 
to  neglect  the  great  objects  for  which  it  was  given,  and  pay 
it,  sometimes  squander  it  away,  for  different  purposes, 
oftentimes  for  useless,  yea,  hurtful  ones,  yea,  often  even  to 
bribe  and  corrupt  the  very  officers  of  government,  to  betray 
their  trust,  and  contaminate  the  State,  even  in  its  public 
offices — to  force  people  to  buy  their  own  destruction,  and 
pay  for  it  with  their  hard  labor,  the  very  sweat  of  their  brow, 
is  a  crime  of  so  high  a  nature,  that  I  know  not  any  gibbet 
too  cruel  for  such  offenders. 

6.  I  would  further  propose,  that  the  aforesaid  great 
ministers  of  state  shall  compose  a  Council  of  State,  to  whose 
number  Congress  may  add  three  others,  viz., one  from  New 
England,  one  from  the  middle  States,  and  one  from  the 
southern  States,  one  of  which  to  be  appointed  President  by 
Congress;  to  all  of  whom  shall  be  committed  the  supreme 

^-  executive  authority  of  the  States  (all  and  singular  of  them 
ever  accountable  to  Congress)  who  shall  superintend  all 
the  executive  departments,  and  appoint  all  executive 
officers,  who  shall  ever  be  accountable  to,  and  removable 
for  just  cause  by,  them  or  Congress,  i.  e.,  either  of  them. 

7.  I  propose  further,  that  the  pov/ers  of  Congress,  and  all 
the  other  departments,  acting  under  them,  shall  all  be 
restricted  to  such  matters  only  of  general  necessity  and 
utility  to  all  the  States,  as  cannot  come  within  the  juris- 
diction of  any  particular  State,  or  to  which  the  authority 
of  any  particular  State  is  not  competent :  so  that  each 
particular  State  sliall  enjoy  all  sovereignty  and  supreme 
authority  to  all  intents  and  purposes,  excepting  only  those 
high  authorities  and  powers  by  them  delegated  to  Congress, 
for  the  purposes  of  the  general  union. 

There  remains  one  very  important  article  still  to  be 
discussed,  viz.,  what  methods  the  Constitution  shall  point 
out,  to  enforce  the  acts  and  requisitions  of  Congress  through 
the  several  States;  and  how  the  States  which  refuse  or 
delay  obedience  to  such  acts  and  requitisions,  shall  be 
treated :  this,  I  know,  is  a  particular  of  the  greatest  delicacy, 


40 

as  well  as  of  the  utmost  importance;  and  therefore,  I  think, 
ought  to  be  decidedly  settled  by  the  Constitution,  in  our 
coolest  hours,  whilst  no  passions  or  prejudices  exist,  which 
may  be  excited  by  the  great  interests  or  strong  circumstances 
of  any  particular  case  which  may  happen. 

I  know  that  supreme  authorities  are  liable  to  err,  as  well 
as  subordinate  ones.  I  know  that  courts  may  be  in  the 
wrong,  as  well  as  the  people;  such  is  the  imperfect  state 
of  human  nature  in  all  ranks  and  degrees  of  men;  but  we 
must  take  hunian  nature  as  it  is;  it  cannot  be  mended; 
and  we  are  compelled  both  by  wisdom  and  necessity,  to 
adopt  such  methods  as  promise  the  greatest  attainable  good, 
though  perhaps  not  the  greatest  possible,  and  such  as  are 
liable  to  the  fewest  inconveniences,  though  not  altogether 
free  of  them. 

This  is  a  question  of  such  magnitude,  that  I  think  it 
necessary  to  premise  the  great  natural  principles  on  which 
its  decision  ought  to  depend — In  the  present  state  of  human 
nature,  all  human  life  is  a  life  of  chances;  it  is  impossible 
to  make  any  interest  so  certain,  but  there  will  be  a  chance 
against  it ;  and  we  are  in  all  cases  obliged  to  adopt  a  chance 
against  us,  in  order  to  bring  ourselves  within  the  benefit 
of  a  greater  chance  in  our  favor;  and  that  calculation  of 
chances  which  is  grounded  on  the  great  natural  principles 
of  truth  and  fitness,  is  of  all  others  the  most  likely  to  come 
out  right. 

1.  No  laws  of  any  State  whatever,  which  do  not  carry  in 
them  a  force  which  extends  to  their  effectual  and  final 
execution,  can  afford  a  certain  or  sufficient  security  to  the 
subject :  this  is  too  plain  to  need  any  proof. 

2.  Laws  or  ordinances  of  any  kind  (especially  of  august 
bodies  of  high  dignity  and  consequence),  which  fail  of 
execution  are  much  worse  than  none;  they  weaken  the 
government ;  expose  it  to  contempt ;  destroy  the  confidence 
of  all  men,  natives  and  foreigners,  in  it;  and  expose  both 
aggregate  bodies  and  individuals,  who  have  placed  confi- 
dence in  it,  to  many  ruinous  disappointments,  which  they 
would  have  escaped,  had  no  law  or  ordinance  been  made: 
therefore, 

3.  To  appoint  a  Congress  with  powers  to  do  all  acts 
necessary  for  the  support  and  uses  of  the  union;  and 
at  the  same  time  to  leave  all  the  States  at  liberty  to  obey 
them  or  not  with  impunity,  is,  in  every  view,  the  grossest 
absurdity,  worse  than  a  state  of  nature  without  any  supreme 
authority  at  all,  and  at  best  a  ridiculous  effort  of  childish 
nonsense:  and  of  course, 


41 

4.  Every  State  in  the  Union  is  under  the  highest  obli- 
gation to  obey  the  supreme  authority  of  the  whole,  and 
in  the  highest  degree  amenable  to  it,  and  subject  to  the 
highest  censure  for  disobedience — Yet  all  this  notwith- 
standing, I  think  the  soul  that  sins  shall  die,  i.  e.,  the  censure 
of  the  great  supreme  power,  ought  to  be  so  directed,  if 
possible,  as  to  light  on  those  persons,  who  have  betrayed 
their  country,  and  exposed  it  to  dissolution,  by  opposing 
and  rejecting  that  supreme  authority,  which  is  the  band 
of  our  union,  and  from  whence  proceeds  the  principal 
strength  and  energy  of  our  government. 

I  therefore  propose,  that  every  person  whatever,  whether 
in  public  or  private  character,  who  shall,  by  public  vote 
or  overt  act,  disobey  the  supreme  authority,  shall  be  amen- 
able to  Congress,  shall  be  summoned  and  compelled  to  appear 
before  Congress,  and,  on  due  conviction,  suffer  such  fine, 
imprisonment,  or  other  punishment,  as  the  supreme  author- 
ity shall  judge  requisite. 

It  may  be  objected  here,  that  this  will  make  a  Member 
of  Assembly  accountable  to  Congress  for  his  vote  in  Assem- 
bly; I  answer,  it  does  so  in  this  only  case,  viz.,  when  that 
vote  is  to  disobey  the  supreme  authority;  no  Member  of 
Assembly  can  have  right  to  give  such  a  vote,  and  therefore 
ought  to  be  punished  for  so  doing — When  the  supreme 
authority  is  disobeyed,  the  government  must  lose  its  energy 
and  effect,  and  of  course  the  Empire  must  be  shaken  to  its 
very  foundation. 

A  government  which  is  but  half  executed,  or  whose 
operations  may  all  be  stopped  by  a  single  vote,  is  the  most 
dangerous  of  all  institutions. — See  the  present  Poland, 
and  ancient  Greece  buried  in  ruins,  in  consequence  of  this 
fatal  error  in  their  policy.  A  government  which  has  not 
energy  and  effect,  can  never  afford  protection  or  security 
to  its  subjects,  i.  e.,  must  ever  be  ineffectual  to  its  own  ends. 

I  cannot  therefore  admit,  that  the  great  ends  of  our 
Union  should  lie  at  the  mercy  of  a  single  State,  or  that  the 
energy  of  our  government  should  be  checked  by  a  single 
disobedience,  or  that  such  disobedience  should  ever  be 
sheltered  from  censure  and  punishment;  the  consequences 
is  too  capital,  too  fatal  to  be  admitted.  Even  though  I 
know  very  well  that  a  supreme  authority,  with  all  its  dignity 
and  importance,  is  subject  to  passions  like  other  lesser 
powers,  that  they  may  be  and  often  are  heated,  violent, 
oppressive,  and  very  tyrannical;  yet  I  know  also,  that 
perfection  is  not  to  be  hoped  for  in  this  life,  and  we  must 


42 

take  all  institutions  with  their  natural  defects,  or  reject 
them  altogether :  I  will  guard  against  these  abuses  of  power 
as  far  as  possible,  but  I  cannot  give  up  all  government,  or 
destroy  its  necessary  energy,  for  fear  of  these  abuses. 

But  to  fence  them  out  as  far  as  possible,  and  to  give  the 
States  as  great  a  check  on  the  supreme  authority,  as  can 
consist  with  its  necessary  energy  and  effect, 

I  propose  that  any  State  may  petition  Congress  to  repeal 
any  law  or  decision  which  they  have  made,  and  if  more 
than  half  the  States  do  this,  the  law  or  decision  shall  be 
repealed,  let  its  nature  or  importance  be  however  great, 
excepting  only  such  acts  as  create  funds  for  the  public 
credit,  which  shall  never  be  repealed  till  their  end  is  effected, 
or  other  funds  equally  effectual  are  substituted  in  their  place ; 
but  Congress  shall  not  be  obliged  to  repeal  any  of  these  acts, 
so  petitioned  against,  till  they  have  time  to  lay  the  reasons 
of  such  acts  before  such  petitioning  States,  and  to  receive 
their  answer ;  because  such  petitions  may  arise  from  sudden 
heats,  popular  prejudices,  or  the  publication  of  matters 
false  in  fact,  and  may  require  time  and  means  of  cool 
reflection  and  the  fullest  information,  before  the  final  deci- 
sion is  made :  but  if  after  all  more  than  half  of  the  States 
persist  in  their  demand  of  a  repeal,    it  shall   take  place. 

The  reason  is,  the  uneasiness  of  a  majority  of  States 
affords  a  strong  presumption  that  the  act  is  wrong,  for 
uneasiness  arises  much  more  frequently  from  wrong  than 
right;  but  if  the  act  was  good  and  right,  it  would  still  be 
better  to  repeal  and  lose  it,  than  to  force  the  execution  of  it 
against  the  opinion  of  a  major  part  of  the  States;  and 
lastly,  if  every  act  of  Congress  is  subject  to  this  repeal. 
Congress  itself  will  have  stronger  inducement  not  only  to 
examine  well  the  several  acts  under  their  consideration, 
but  also  to  communicate  the  reasons  of  them  to  the  States, 
than  they  would  have  if  their  simple  vote  gave  the  final 
stamp  of  irrevocable  authority  to  their  acts. 

Further  I  propose,  that  if  the  execution  of  any  act  or 
order  of  the  supreme  authority  shall  be  opposed  by  force 
in  any  of  the  States  (which  God  forbid)  it  shall  be  lawful 
for  Congress  to  send  into  such  State  a  sufficient  force  to 
suppress  it. 

On  the  whole,  I  take  it  that  the  very  existence  and  use 
of  our  union  essentially  depends  on  the  full  energy  and 
final  effect  of  the  laws  made  to  support  it;  and  therefore 
I  sacrifice  all  other  considerations  to  this  energy  and  effect, 
and  if  our  Union  is  not  worth  this  purchase,  we  must  give 


43 

it  up — the  nature  of  the  thing  does  not  admit  of  any  other 
alternative. 

I  do  contend  that  our  Union  is  worth  this  purchase — 
with  it,  every  individual  rests  secure  under  its  protection 
against  foreign  or  domestic  insult  and  oppression — without 
it,  we  can  have  no  security  against  the  oppression,  insult, 
and  invasion  of  foreign  powers;  for  no  single  State  is  of 
importance  enough  to  be  an  object  of  treaty  with  them, 
nor,  if  it  was,  could  it  bear  the  expense  of  such  treaties,  or 
support  any  character  or  respect  in  a  dissevered  state, 
but  must  lose  all  respectability  among  the  nations  abroad. 

We  have  a  very  extensive  trade,  which  cannot  be  carried 
on  with  security  and  advantage,  without  treaties  of  com- 
merce and  alliance  with  foreign  nations. 

We  have  an  extensive  western  territory  which  cannot 
otherwise  be  defended  against  the  invasion  of  foreign  nations, 
bordering  on  our  frontiers,  who  will  cover  it  with  their  own 
inhabitants,  and  we  shall  lose  it  forever,  and  our  extent 
of  empire  be  thereby  restrained;  and  what  is  worse,  their 
numerous  posterity  will  in  future  time  drive  ours  into  the 
sea,  as  the  Goths  and  Vandals  formerly  conquered  the 
Romans  in  like  circum.stances,  unless  we  have  the  force 
of  the  union  to  repel  such  invasions.  We  have,  without 
the  union,  no  security  against  the  inroads  and  wars  of  one 
State  upon  another,  by  which  our  wealth  and  strength, 
as  well  as  ease  and  comfort,  will  be  devoured  by  enemies 
growing  out  of  our  own  bowels. 

I  conclude  then,  that  our  union  is  not  only  of  the  most 
essential  consequence  to  the  well-being  of  the  States  in 
general  but  to  that  of  every  individual  citizen  of  them,  and 
of  course  ought  to  be  supported,  and  made  as  useful  and 
safe  as  possible,  by  a  Constitution  which  admits  that  full 
energy  and  final  effect  of  government  which  alone  can  secure 
its  great  ends  and  uses. 

In  a  dissertation  of  this  sort,  I  would  not  wish  to  descend 
to  minutiae,  yet  there  are  some  small  matters  which  have 
important  consequences,  and  therefore  ought  to  be  noticed. 
It  is  necessary  that  Congress  should  have  all  usual  and 
necessary  powers  of  self-preservation  and  order,  e.  g.,  to 
imprison  for  contempt,  insult,  or  interruption,  etc.,  and  to 
expel  their  own  members  for  due  causes,  among  which 
I  would  rank  that  of  non-attendance  on  the  house,  or 
partial  attendance  without  such  excuse  as  shall  satisfy 
the  house. 

Where  there  is  such  vast  authority  and  trust  devolved 
on  Congress,  and  the  grand  and  most  important  interests 


44 

of  the  Empire  rest  on  their  decisions,  it  appears  to  me 
highly  unreasonable  that  we  should  suffer  their  august 
consultations  to  be  suspended,  or  their  dignity,  authority, 
and  influence  lessened  by  the  idleness,  neglect,  and  non- 
attendance  of  its  members;  for  we  know  that  the  acts  of 
a  thin  house  do  not  usually  carry  with  them  the  same 
degree  of  weight  and  respect  as  those  of  a  full  house. 

Besides  I  think,  when  a  man  is  deputed  a  delegate  in 
Congress,  and  has  undertaken  the  business,  the  whole 
Empire  becomes  of  course  possessed  of  a  right  to  his  best 
and  constant  services,  which  if  any  member  refuses  or 
neglects,  the  Em.pire  is  injured  and  ought  to  resent  the 
injur}^,  at  least  so  far  as  to  expel  and  send  him  home,  that 
so  his  place  may  be  better  supplied. 

I  have  one  argument  in  favor  of  my  whole  plan,  viz., 
it  is  so  formed  that  no  men  of  dull  intellects,  or  small  knowl- 
edge, or  of  habits  too  idle  for  constant  attendance,  or  close 
and  steady  attention,  can  do  the  business  with  any  tolerable 
degree  of  respectability,  nor  can  they  find  either  honor, 
profit,  or  satisfaction  in  being  there,  and  of  course,  I  could 
wish  that  the  choice  of  the  electors  might  never  fall  on  such 
a  man,  or  if  it  should,  that  he  might  have  sense  enough 
(of  pain  at  least,  if  not  of  shame)  to  decline  his  acceptance. 

For  after  all  that  can  be  done,  I  do  not  think  that  a  good 
administration  depends  wholly  on  a  good  Constitution  and 
good  laws,  for  insufficient  or  bad  men  will  always  make 
bad  work,  and  a  bad  administration,  let  the  Constitution 
and  laws  be  ever  so  good;  the  management  of  able,  faithful, 
and  upright  men  alone  can  cause  an  administration  to 
brighten,  and  the  dignity  and  wisdom  of  an  Empire  to  rise 
into  respect;  make  truth  the  line  and  measure  of  public 
decision;  give  weight  and  authority  to  the  government, 
and  security  and  peace  to  the  subject. 

We  now  hope  that  we  are  on  the  close  of  a  war  of  mighty 
effort  and  great  distress,  against  the  greatest  power  on  earth, 
whetted  into  the  most  keen  resentment  and  savage  fierce- 
ness, which  can  be  excited  by  wounded  pride,  and  which 
usually  rises  higher  between  brother  and  brother  offended, 
than  between  strangers  in  contest.  Twelve  of  the  Thirteen 
United  States  have  felt  the  actual  and  cruel  invasions 
of  the  enemy,  and  eleven  of  our  capitals  have  been  under 
their  power,  first  or  last,  during  the  dreadful  conflict;  but 
a  good  Providence,  our  own  virtue  and  firmness,  and  the 
help  of  our  friends,  have  enabled  us  to  rise  superior  to  all 
the  power  of  our  adversaries,  and  made  them  seek  to  be 
at  peace  with  us. 


45 

During  the  extreme  pressures  of  the  war,  indeed  many 
errors  in  our  administration  have  been  committed,  when 
we  could  not  have  experience  and  time  for  reflection,  to 
make  us  wise;  but  these  will  easily  be  excused,  forgiven, 
and  forgotten,  if  we  can  now,  while  at  leisure,  find  virtue, 
wisdom,  and  foresight  enough  to  correct  them,  and  form 
such  establishments,  as  shall  secure  the  great  ends  of  our 
union,  and  give  dignity,  force,  utility,  and  permanency 
to  our  Empire. 

It  is  a  pity  we  should  lose  the  honor  and  blessings  which 
have  cost  us  so  dear,  for  want  of  wisdom  and  firmness 
in  measures,  which  are  essential  to  our  preservation.  It  is 
now  at  our  option,  either  to  fall  back  into  our  original 
atoms,  or  form  such  an  union,  as  shall  command  the  respect 
of  the  world,  and  give  honor  and  security  to  our  people. 

This  vast  subject  lies  with  mighty  weight  on  my  mind, 
and  I  have  bestowed  on  it  my  utmost  attention,  and  here 
offer  the  public  the  best  thoughts  and  sentiments  I  am 
master  of.  I  have  confined  myself  in  this  dissertation 
entirely  to  the  nature,  reason,  and  truth  of  my  subject, 
without  once  adverting  to  the  reception  it  might  meet 
with  from  men  of  different  prejudices  or  interests.  To 
find  the  truth,  not  to  carry  a  point,  has  been  my  object. 

I  have  not  the  vanity  to  imagine  that  my  sentiments 
may  be  adopted ;  I  shall  have  all  the  reward  I  wish  or  expect, 
if  my  dissertation  shall  throw  any  light  on  the  great  subject, 
shall  excite  an  emulation  of  inquiry,  and  animate  some 
abler  genius  to  form  a  plan  of  greater  perfection,  less  objec- 
tionable, and  more  useful. 


NOTES  APPENDED  BY  PELATIAH  WEBSTER  TO  THE  RE= 
PUBLICATION  MADE  AT  PHILADELPHIA  IN  1791. 

NOTE  I. 

I.  Forming  a  plan  of  confederation,  or  a  system  of  general 
government  of  the  United  States,  engrossed  the  attention 
of  Congress  from  the  declaration  of  independence,  July  4, 
1776,  till  the  same  was  completed  by  Congress,  July  9,  1778, 
and  recommended  to  the  several  States  for  ratification, 
which  finally  took  place,  March  i,  1781;  from  which  time 
the  said  confederation  was  considered  as  the  grand  consti- 
tution of  the  general  government,  and  the  whole  adminis- 
tration was  conformed  to  it. 

And  as  it  had  stood  the  test  of  discussion  in  Congress 


46 

for  two  years,  before  they  completed  and  adopted  it,  and 
in  all  the  States  for  three  years  more,  before  it  was  finally 
ratified,  one  would  have  thought  that  it  must  have  been  a 
very  finished  and  perfect  plan  of  government. 

But  on  trial  of  it  in  practice,  it  was  found  to  be  extremely 
weak,  defective,  totally  inefficient,  and  altogether  inade- 
quate to  its  great  ends  and  purposes.     For, 

1.  It  blended  the  legislative  and  executive  powers 
together  in  one  body. 

2.  This  body,  viz..  Congress,  consisted  of  but  one  house, 
without  any  check  upon  their  resolutions. 

3.  The  powers  of  Congress  in  very  few  instances  were 
definitive  and  final ;  in  the  most  important  articles  of  govern- 
ment they  could  do  no  more  than  recommend  to  the  several 
States;  the  consent  of  every  one  of  which  was  necessary 
to  give  legal  sanction  to  any  act  so  recommended. 

4.  They  could  assess  and  levy  no  taxes. 

5.  They  could  institute  and  execute  no  punishments, 
except  in  the  military  department. 

6.  They  had  no  power  of  deciding  or  controlling  the 
contentions  and  disputes  of  different  States  with  each 
other. 

7.  They  could  not  regulate  the  general  trade:  or, 

8.  Even  make  laws  to  secure  either  public  treaties  with 
foreign  States,  or  the  persons  of  public  ambassadors,  or 
to  punish  violations  or  injuries  done  to  either  of  them. 

9.  They  could  institute  no  general  judiciary  powers. 

10.  They  could  regulate  no  public  roads,  canals,  or  inland 
navigation,  etc.,  etc.,  etc. 

And  what  caps  all  the  rest  was,  that  (whilst  under  such  an 
inefficient  political  constitution,  the  only  chance  we  had  of 
any  tolerable  administration  lay  wholly  in  the  prudence 
and  wisdom  of  the  men  who  happened  to  take  the  lead  in  our 
public  councils)  it  was  fatally  provided  by  the  absurd  doc- 
trine of  rotation,  that  if  any  Member  of  Congress  by  three 
years'  experience  and  application,  had  qualified  himself 
to  manage  our  public  affairs  with  consistency  and  fitness, 
that  he  should  be  constitutionally  and  absolutely  rendered 
incapable  of  serving  any  longer,  till  by  three  years'  discon- 
tinuance, he  had  pretty  well  lost  the  cue  or  train  of  the 
public  counsels,  and  forgot  the  ideas  and  plans  which  made 
his  service  useful  and  important;  and,  in  the  mean  time, 
his  place  should  be  supplied  by  a  fresh  man,  who  had  the 
whole  matter  to  learn,  and  when  he  had  learned  it,  was 
to  give  place  to  another  fresh  man;  and  so  on  to  the  end 
of  the  chapter. 


47 

The  sensible  mind  of  the  United  States,  by  long  experience 
of  the  fatal  mischiefs  of  anarchy,  or  (which  is  about  the  same 
thing)  of  this  ridiculous,  inefficient  form  of  government, 
began  to  apprehend  that  there  was  something  wrong  in  our 
policy,  which  ought  to  be  redressed  and  mended;  but 
nobody  undertook  to  delineate  the  necessary  amendments. 

I  was  then  pretty  much  at  leisure,  and  was  fully  of  opinion 
(though  the  sentiment  at  that  time  would  not  very  well 
bear)  that  it  would  be  ten  times  easier  to  form  a  new  consti- 
tution than  to  mend  the  old  one.  I  therefore  sat  myself 
down  to  sketch  out  the  leading  principles  of  that  political 
constitution,  which  I  thought  necessary  to  the  preservation 
and  happiness  of  the  United  States  of  America,  which  are 
comprised  in  this  Dissertation. 

I  hope  the  reader  will  please  to  consider,  that  these  are 
the  original  thoughts  of  a  private  individual,  dictated  by 
the  nature  of  the  subject  only,  long  before  the  important 
theme  became  the  great  object  of  discussion,  in  the  most 
dignified  and  important  assembly,  which  ever  sat  or  decided 
in  America, 

NOTE  2.  ; 

At  the  time  when  this  Dissertation  was  written  (Feb.i6, 
1783)  the  defects  and  insufficiency  of  the  Old  Federal 
Constitution  were  universally  felt  and  acknowledged ;  it  was 
manifest,  not  only  that  the  internal  police,  justice,  security 
and  peace  of  the  States  could  never  be  preserved  under  it, 
but  the  finances  and  public  credit  would  necessarily  become 
so  embarrassed,  precarious,  and  void  of  support,  that  no 
public  movement,  which  depended  on  the  revenue,  could 
be  managed  with  any  effectual  certainty:  but  though  the 
public  mind  was  under  full  conviction  of  all  these  mischiefs, 
and  was  contemplating  a  remedy,  yet  the  public  ideas  were 
not  at  all  concentrated,  nmch  less  arranged  into  any  new 
system  or  form  of  government,  which  would  obviate  these 
evils.  Under  these  circumstances  I  offered  this  Dissertation 
to  the  public :  how  far  the  principles  of  it  were  adopted  or 
rejected  in  the  New  Constitution,  which  was  four  years 
afterwards  (Sept.  17,  1787)  formed  by  the  General  Conven- 
tion, and  since  ratified  by  all  the  States,  is  obvious  to 
every  one. 

I  wish  here  to  remark  the  great  particulars  of  my  plan 
which  were  rejected  by  the  Convention. 

I.  My  plan  was  to  keep  the  legislative  and  executive 
departments  entirely  distinct ;  the  one  to  consist  of  the  two 


48 

houses  of  Congress,  the  other  to  rest  entirely  in  the  Grand 
Council  of  State. 

2.  I  proposed  to  introduce  a  Chamber  of  Commerce,  to 
consist  of  merchants,  who  should  be  consulted  by  the 
legislature  in  all  matters  of  trade  and  revenue,  and  which 
should  have  the  conducting  the  revenue  committed  to  them. 

The  first  of  these  the  Convention  qualified;  the  second 
they  say  nothing  of,  i.  e.,  take  no  notice  of  it. 

3.  I  proposed  that  the  great  officers  of  state  should  have 
the  perusal  of  all  bills,  before  they  were  enacted  into  laws, 
and  should  be  required  to  give  their  opinion  of  them,  as  far 
as  they  affected  the  public  interest  in  their  several  depart- 
ments; which  report  of  them  Congress  should  cause  to  be 
read  in  their  respective  houses,  and  entered  on  their  minutes. 
This  is  passed  over  without  notice. 

4.  I  proposed  that  all  public  officers  appointed  by  the 
executive  authority,  should  be  amenable  both  to  them  and 
to  the  legislative  power,  and  removable  for  just  cause  by 
either  of  them.     This  is  qualified  by  the  Convention. 

And  in  as  much  as  my  sentiments  in  these  respects  were 
either  qualified  or  totally  neglected  by  the  Convention, 
I  suppose  they  were  wrong;  however,  the  whole  matter 
is  submitted  to  the  politicians  of  the  present  age,  and  to 
our  posterity  in  future. 

In  sundry  other  things,  the  Convention  have  gone  into 
minutiae,  e.  g.,  respecting  elections  of  President,  Senators, 
and  Representatives  in  Congress,  etc.,  which  I  proposed 
to  leave  at  large  to  the  wisdom  and  discretion  of  Congress, 
and  of  the  several  States. 

Great  reasons  may  doubtless  be  assigned  for  their  decision, 
and  perhaps  some  little  ones  for  mine.  Time,  the  great 
arbiter  of  all  human  plans,  may,  after  a  while,  give  his 
decision;  but  neither  the  Convention  nor  myself  will  prob- 
ably live  to  feel  either  the  exultation  or  mortification  of  his 
approbation  or  disapprobation  of  either  of  our  plans. 

But  if  any  of  these  questions  should  in  future  time  become 
objects  of  discussion,  neither  the  vast  dignity  of  the  Conven- 
tion, nor  the  low,  unnoticed  state  of  myself,  will  be  at  all 
considered  in  the  debates ;  the  merits  of  the  matter,  and  the 
interests  connected  with  or  arising  out  of  it,  will  alone 
dictate  the  decision. 

Humbly  presented  by 

HANNIS   TAYLOR. 


^NIVE^^... 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA   LIBRARY 

BERKELEY 

THIS  BOOK  IS  Dui^  THE  LAST  BATE 

STAMPED  BELOW 

50c  prU°L"Xx1hrth1rT.^^^  -'^^•-'  to  a  fine  of 
J^£!I£!!21^iJoan  period         ''^^P'''^'-*"""   is   made   before 


■'"  3' 1917 

9lun'586B 
REC'D  LD 

JUH101958 


507n-7,'16 


ir>?89i 


